Go to Page Main Content
NASA - Goddard Institute for Space Studies + NASA Portal
+ Goddard Space Flight Center
+ GSFC Earth Sciences Division
FIND IT @ NASA
NASA Homepage Goddard Institute for Space Studies

ABSTRACT

Wilson and Sofia 1976

Wilson, R.E., and S. Sofia, 1976: Effects of tidal distortion on binary-star velocity curves and ellipsoidal variation. Astrophys. J., 203, 182-186.

Radial velocity curves for the more massive components of binaries with extreme mass ratios can show a large distortion due to tides, as first recognized by Sterne. Binaries in which the effect is large should be rare because nearly all such binaries would be in the rapid phase of mass transfer. However, the optical counterparts of some X-ray binaries may show the effect, which would then serve as a new means of extracting considerable information from the observations. The essential parts of the computational procedure are given. Light curves for ellipsoidal variables with extreme mass ratios were also computed, and were found to be less sinusoidal than those with normal mass ratios.

  • Complete document is not available.

Citation Styles

Show: ACP, AGU, AMS, ApJ, JQSRT, Science style

+ GISS Home

PUBLICATIONS
  • Publications Main Page
  • Authors
  • GISS Best Publication Award
  • Dissertations
  • Advanced Search
  • Publications Help
USA.gov

End of Page