In 1926 in the opening paragraph of his now-classic book, The Internal Constitution of the Stars, Sir Arthur Eddington lamented, “What appliance can pierce through the outer layers of a star and test the conditions within?” While he considered theory to be the proper answer to that question, there is now an observational answer: asteroseismology. We are now able to see the internal rotation of the sun half way down to its core; we can probe the crystallised diamond core of a pulsating white dwarf star; we can resolve the three-dimensional pulsation and atmospheric structure of the most peculiar stars in the sky; we can detect differential rotation between the core and atmosphere of a B star; we can examine tidal influence in pulsating, eclipsing close binary stars; we can precisely measure masses of both the entire star and H and He atmospheric layers in white dwarf stars; we can even see pulsation and detect planets in the same star with exquisitely precise observations — observations comparable to those for the sun only two decades ago.

Asteroseismology is closely related to planet-finding in the high precision demands of the observational techniques used for both. The NASA Kepler Mission will be launched in February 2009 to search for Earth-sized planets, and – as a secondary mission – to carry out asteroseismic observations in support of the planet hunting.

This talk will introduce the concepts of asteroseismology and show a selection of exciting observational results, as well as discuss the unprecedented astrophysical opportunities anticipated from the Kepler data.