Fourier analysis of the light curves of eclipsing binaries in the case of transit eclipses,with application to the eclipsing system YZ Cassiopeiae

The aim of this paper is to extend the Fourier approach to the transit eclipses, terminating in annular phase, with an application to YZ Cassiopeiae. The results turn out to be more complicated than those obtained by Kopal for total eclipses. However, the solution can still be obtained by successive approximations without resorting to any tables of special functions.Section 1 contains an outline of the problem. In Section 2, the evaluation of the theoretical momentsA _2m for transit eclipses is given. An application of the Fourier method to the light curves of YZ Cas is presented in Section 3. Finally, in Section 4, a general discussion of the results is given.