czsky/en/star/U_Cep.md

name	constellation	created_by	created_date	updated_by	updated_date
U Cep	Cep	editor.cs	2023-11-05 17:31:13.107784	editor.cs	2023-11-05 17:31:13.107790

The interesting short-period variable star. The brighter B-type component is eclipsed by a larger, but fainter G-type giant every 2.5 days. It changes in brightness from 6.7 mag to 9.2 mag, with a four-hour descent to minimum followed by two hours of total eclipse. Due to the close true separation, the brighter component pulls a significant amount of mass from the outer layer of the faint giant, resulting in a shortening of the orbital period by 4 minutes over the past century. The nearby third component appears to be part of the system as well, but it does not orbit along this path.