Superhumps in Cataclysmic Binaries. IV. MV Lyrae

David Skillman, Joseph Patterson, and John Thorstensen

Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific

June 1995, Volume 107, Page 545

We report the results of a photometric and spectroscopic campaign on the nova-like variable MV Lyrae in a "high state" during August/September 1993. Radial-velocity observations establish an underlying binary period of 0.1329 ± 0.0004 d, with a remarkably small K-amplitude of 25 ± 4 km/s. The very low K-values for both stars in the binary attest to a very low binary inclination, in the range 10° - 13°. Our photometric data seems to confirm two of the period signals reported by Borisov [A&A, 261, 154 (1992)]: quasi-periodic oscillations with a period of 48 minutes, and a slow wave with a period ~3.6 d. On the third signal reported by Borisov, "superhumps" with a period of 0.138 d, our data are less strongly supportive but still tend to favor the existence of the signal. The mass ratio of the binary is 0.43^+0.19_-0.13, somewhat higher than usually assumed in theoretical studies of superhumps.

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Copyright © 1995 Astronomical Society of the Pacific.