Inconsistencies in the application of harmonic analysis to pulsating stars

Abstract

Using ultra-precise data from space instrumentation we found that the underlying functions of stellar light curves from some AF pul- sating stars are non-analytic, and consequently their Fourier expansion is not guaranteed. This result demonstrates that periodograms do not provide a mathematically consistent estimator of the frequency content for this kind of variable stars. More importantly, this constitutes the first counterexample against the current paradigm which considers that any physical process is described by a contin- uous (band-limited) function that is infinitely differentiable.