Predicting Granulation "Flicker" and Radial Velocity "Jitter" from Spectroscopic Observables

Surface granulation can be predicted with the mass, metallicity, and frequency of maximum oscillation power of a star. Using the orders-of-magnitude larger Apache Point Observatory Galaxy Evolution Experiment-Kepler (APOGEE-Kepler) sample, we recalibrate the relationship fit by Corsaro et al. for "flicker," an easier-to-compute diagnostic of this granulation. We find that the relationship between the stellar parameters and flicker is significantly different for dwarf and subgiant stars than it is for red giants. We also confirm a dependence of flicker amplitude on metallicity as seen originally by Corsaro et al., although the dependence found here is somewhat weaker. Using the same APOGEE-Kepler sample, we demonstrate that spectroscopic measurements alone provide sufficient information to estimate the flicker amplitude to 7% for giants, and 20% for dwarfs and subgiants. We provide a relationship that depends on effective temperature, surface gravity, and metallicity, and calculate predicted flicker values for 129,000 stars with APOGEE spectra. Finally, we use published relationships between flicker and radial velocity jitter to estimate minimum jitter values for these same 129,000 stars, and we identify stars whose total jitter is likely to be even larger than the granulation-driven jitter by virtue of large-amplitude photometric variability.