A photoelectric (yellow) light curve for V923 Aquilae, plotted from data presented by Lynds (1960).[1] The length of a full phase cycle is 0.8518 days.
This system was first identified as a likely spectroscopic binary by W. E. Harper in 1937, who noted it showed "narrow intense lines of peculiar spectrum".[10]P. W. Merrill and C. G. Burwell identified it as a shell star in 1949.[11][12] Merrill and A. L. Lowen showed in 1953 that the shell displayed large radial velocity variations.[13] A photometric study by C. R. Lynds in 1960 showed the system varied in brightness with an amplitude of more than 0.1 in magnitude and a characteristic period of 0.85 days, although it does not behave periodically over long time intervals.[1]
A more thorough investigation by P. Koubský and associates in 1989 using long-term radial velocity measurements determined this is a spectroscopic binary with an orbital period of 214.75 days. There is also an overlaying long-term cyclical variation of changing amplitude and period. The modelled binary system shows a primary with a class of around B5–7e and a low mass secondary separated by around 250 times the radius of the Sun (250 R☉). They hypothesized that the long-term variation was due to an envelope created by a mass transfer from the secondary component to the primary.[14] However, the mass transfer concept was later brought into question and remains unverified as of 2004.[9]
^ abcHaupt, H. F.; Schroll, A. (1974), "Photoelektrische Photometrie von Shell-Sternen", Astronomy and Astrophysics Supplement Series, 15: 311, Bibcode:1974A&AS...15..311H.
^ abZorec, J.; et al. (November 2016), "Critical study of the distribution of rotational velocities of Be stars. I. Deconvolution methods, effects due to gravity darkening, macroturbulence, and binarity", Astronomy & Astrophysics, 595: 26, Bibcode:2016A&A...595A.132Z, doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201628760, hdl:11336/37946.
^Houk, N.; Swift, C. (1999), "Michigan catalogue of two-dimensional spectral types for the HD Stars", Michigan Spectral Survey, 5, Bibcode:1999MSS...C05....0H.
^Harper, W. E. (1937), "The radial velocities of 917 stars", Publications of the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory Victoria, 7: 1–97, Bibcode:1937PDAO....7....1H.
^Merrill, Paul W.; Burwell, Cora G. (November 1949), "Second Supplement to the Mount Wilson Catalogue and Bibliography of Stars of Classes B and a whose Spectra have Bright Hydrogen Lines", Astrophysical Journal, 110: 387, Bibcode:1949ApJ...110..387M, doi:10.1086/145215.
^Koubský, P.; et al. (February 1989), "Properties and Nature of Be Stars. 13. Radial-Velocity Variations of the Shell Star V 923 AQL (HD 183 656) In the Past Sixty Years", Bulletin of the Astronomical Institute of Czechoslovakia, 40: 31, Bibcode:1989BAICz..40...31K.