English

Flavours of variability: 29 RR Lyrae stars observed with Kepler

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics 2015-05-19 v1

Abstract

We present our analysis of Kepler observations of 29 RR Lyrae stars, based on 138-d of observation. We report precise pulsation periods for all stars. Nine of these stars had incorrect or unknown periods in the literature. Fourteen of the stars exhibit both amplitude and phase Blazhko modulations, with Blazhko periods ranging from 27.7 to more than 200 days. For V445 Lyr, a longer secondary variation is also observed in addition to its 53.2-d Blazhko period. The unprecedented precision of the Kepler photometry has led to the discovery of the the smallest modulations detected so far. Moreover, additional frequencies beyond the well-known harmonics and Blazhko multiplets have been found. These frequencies are located around the half-integer multiples of the main pulsation frequency for at least three stars. In four stars, these frequencies are close to the first and/or second overtone modes. The amplitudes of these periodicities seem to vary over the Blazhko cycle. V350 Lyr, a non-Blazhko star in our sample, is the first example of a double mode RR Lyrae star that pulsates in its fundamental and second overtone modes.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1007.3928,
  title  = {Flavours of variability: 29 RR Lyrae stars observed with Kepler},
  author = {J. M. Benkő and K. Kolenberg and R. Szabó and D. W. Kurtz and S. Bryson and J. Bregman and M. Still and R. Smolec and J. Nuspl and J. Nemec and P. Moskalik and G. Kopacki and Z. Kolláth and E. Guggenberger and M. Di~Criscienzo and J. Christensen-Dalsgaard and H. Kjeldsen and W. J. Borucki and D. Koch and J. M. Jenkins and J. E. Van Cleve},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1007.3928},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

9 pages, 7 figures 2 tables. Accepted for publication in MNRAS