Connection between the period and the amplitude of the Blazhko effect

TL;DR

This paper investigates a potential correlation between the modulation period and amplitude of the Blazhko effect in RR Lyrae stars, suggesting that longer periods tend to have higher amplitudes, which could inform the physics behind the phenomenon.

Contribution

It identifies a possible relationship between modulation period and amplitude in Blazhko RR Lyrae stars using space-based and ground data, offering new constraints for theoretical models.

Findings

Longer modulation periods generally correlate with higher amplitudes.

The relationship is more a tendency than a strict rule.

Detectable in Kepler, CoRoT, and ground-based data.

Abstract

We found a possible relationship between the modulation period and the amplitude of the Blazhko RR Lyrae stars: long modulation period generally implies high modulation amplitude while the short modulation period results in small amplitude. Although this effect is much more a tendency than a strict rule, it can be detected easily in the space-born time series data produced by Kepler and CoRoT. Good quality ground-based data show this relation, too. This phenomenon could give us constraints for the physics of the Blazhko effect.