2013MNRAS.431.2024S

Current precision in radial velocity (RV) measurements of binary stars reaches ∼ 2ms-1. This level of precision means that RV models have to take into account additional non-Keplerian effects such as tidal and rotational distortion of the components of a binary star, relativistic effects and orbital precession. Such an approach is necessary when one wants to search for planets or precisely measure fundamental parameters of stars with a very high accuracy using precision RVs of binary stars. We generate synthetic binaries using Yonsei-Yale stellar models. For typical representatives, we investigate the impact of various orbital orientations and different non-Keplerian effects on the RV curves. To this end, we simulate RV observations with an added white noise of different scale. Subsequently, we try to reconstruct the input orbital parameters and their errors by fitting a model using a standard least-squares method. In particular, we investigate the connection between the tidal distortion of the shape of the stars and the best-fitting orbital eccentricity; the possibility of deriving orbital inclination of a non-eclipsing binary star by exploiting relativistic effects and the circumstances in which the orbital precession can be detected. We confirm that the method proposed by Zucker & Alexander to obtain orbital inclination with use of the relativistic effect does work in favourable cases and that it can be used even for orbital configurations far from an edge-on orientation. We show that the RV variations imposed by tidally distorted stars can mimic non-zero eccentricity in some binaries. The scale of such an effect depends on the RV accuracy. Finally, we demonstrate that the apsidal precession can be easily detected with precision RVs. In particular, we can detect orbital precession of 10-4, 10-3 radyr-1 for precision of RVs of 1 and 10ms-1, respectively.