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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 April 2016
A periodic modulation in the optical flux from Nova Cygni 1975 has been observed since shortly after outburst (Tempesti 1975) and the period is known to have varied by at least a few percent (Semeniuk et al. 1976). We account for the modulation in terms of a simple geometrical model in which the wind emanating from the nova is shadowed by its binary companion (see Fabian and Pringle 1977 for a fuller account). This produces an azimuthal variation in the radius of the surface of last scattering, RS, which an observer sees as a periodic modulation of the. continuum with period roughly equal to the orbital period. Variation of the observed period is accounted for in terms of variation of the size of RS.