Fourier analysis of the light curves of eclipsing variable stars

Abstract

The aim of the present paper is to establish the explicit forms of the photometric perturbations, in the frequency-domain, of close binaries, whose components are distorted by axial rotation and mutual tidal action.

Following a brief introduction, Section 2 describes the light changes and the photometric perturbations within eclipses in the frequency-domain. In Section 3 the explicit forms of the perturbations for occultation eclipses terminating in totality are given; while in Section 4 analogous results are established for transit eclipses terminating in annular phases. In this latter case the results can be expressed in terms of the photometric perturbations for total eclipses and in terms of some series. To facilitate applications to actual stars these series have been computed and their results are represented in Table I and by the Graphs. Finally, Section 5 gives a discussion of the results.

An extension of the photometric perturbations to the case of partial eclipses will be given in a subsequent communication.