In this paper we present a catalog of 4584 eclipsing binaries observed during the first two years (26 sectors) of the TESS survey. We discuss selection criteria for eclipsing binary candidates, detection of hitherto unknown eclipsing systems, determination of the ephemerides, the validation and triage process, and the derivation of heuristic estimates for the ephemerides. Instead of keeping to the widely used discrete classes, we propose a binary star morphology classification based on a dimensionality reduction algorithm. Finally, we present statistical properties of the sample, we qualitatively estimate completeness, and we discuss the results. The work presented here is organized and performed within the TESS Eclipsing Binary Working Group, an open group of professional and citizen scientists; we conclude by describing ongoing work and future goals for the group. The catalog is available from http://tessEBs.villanova.edu and from MAST.

We present the physical properties of V404 Lyr exhibiting eclipse timing variations and multiperiodic pulsations from all historical data including the Kepler and Super-WASP observations. Detailed analyses of 2,922 minimum epochs showed that the orbital period has varied through a combination with an upward-opening parabola and two sinusoidal variations, with periods of P 3 =649 d and P 4 =2,154 d and semi-amplitudes of K 3 =193 s and K 4 =49 s, respectively. The secular period increase with a rate of +1.41 ×10 −7 d yr −1 could be interpreted as a combination of the secondary to primary mass transfer and angular momentum loss. The most reasonable explanation for both sinusoids is a pair of light-travel-time effects due to two circumbinary objects with projected masses of M 3 =0.47 M ⊙ and M 4 =0.047 M ⊙ . The third-body parameters are consistent with those calculated using the Wilson-Devinney binary code. For the orbital inclinations i 4 43 • , the fourth component has a mass within the hydrogen-burning limit of ∼0.07 M ⊙ , which implies that it is a brown dwarf. A satisfactory model for the Kepler light curves was obtained through applying a cool spot to the secondary component. The results demonstrate that the close eclipsing pair is in a semi-detached, but near-contact, configuration; the primary fills approximately 93% of its limiting lobe and is larger than the lobe-filling secondary. Multiple frequency analyses were applied to the light residuals after subtracting the synthetic eclipsing curve from the Kepler data. This revealed that the primary component of V404 Lyr is a γ Dor type pulsating star, exhibiting seven pulsation frequencies in the range of 1.85−2.11 d −1 with amplitudes of 1.38−5.72 mmag and pulsation constants of 0.24−0.27 d. The seven frequencies were clearly identified as high-order low-degree gravity-mode oscillations which might be excited through tidal interaction. Only eight eclipsing binaries have been known to contain γ Dor pulsating components and, therefore, V404 Lyr will be an important test-bed for investigating these rare and interesting objects.

Among quadruples or higher multiplicity stars, only a few doubly eclipsing binary systems have been discovered. They are important targets to understand the formation and evolution of multiple stellar systems because we can obtain accurate stellar parameters from photometric and spectroscopic studies. We present the observational results of this kind of rare object 1SWASP J093010.78+533859.5, for which the doubly eclipsing feature had been detected previously from the SuperWASP photometric archive. Individual PSF photometry for two objects with a separation of about 1.9 arcsec was performed for the first time in this study. Our time-series photometric data confirms the finding of Lohr et al. (2013) that the bright object A is an Algol-type detached eclipsing binary and the fainter B is a W UMa-type contact eclipsing. Using the highresolution optical spectra, we obtained well-defined radial velocity variations of system A. Furthermore, stationary spectral lines were detected that must have originated from a further, previously unrecognized stellar component. It was confirmed by the third object contribution from the light curve analysis. No spectral feature of the system B was detected, probably due to motion blur by long exposure time. We obtained the binary parameters and the absolute dimensions of the systems A and B from light curve synthesis with and without radial velocities, respectively. The primary and secondary components of system A have a spectral type of K1 and K5 main sequences, respectively. Two components of system B have nearly the same type of K3 main sequence. Light variations for both binaries are satisfactorily modeled by using two-spot models with one starspot on each component. We estimated the distances to systems A and B individually. Two systems may have similar distances of about 70 pc and seem to be gravitationally bound with a separation of about 130 AU. In conclusion, we suggest that 1SWASP J093010.78+533859.5 is a quintuple stellar system with a hierarchical structure of a triple system A(ab)c and a binary system B(ab).

OB associations are the prevailing star forming sites in the Galaxy. Up to now, the process of how OB associations were formed remained a mystery. A possible process is self-regulating star formation driven by feedback from massive stars. However, although a number of observational studies uncovered various signposts of feedbackdriven star formation, the effectiveness of such feedback has been questioned. Stellar and gas kinematics is a promising tool to capture the relative motion of newborn stars and gas away from ionizing sources. We present high-resolution spectroscopy of stars and gas in the young open cluster NGC 1893. Our findings show that newborn stars and the tadpole nebula Sim 130 are moving away from the central cluster containing two O-type stars, and that the timescale of sequential star formation is about 1 Myr within a 9 parsec distance. The newborn stars formed by feedback from massive stars account for at least 18 per cent of the total stellar population in the cluster, suggesting that this process can play an important role in the formation of OB associations. These results support the self-regulating star formation model.

We present BV photometry for 54 variables in the metal-rich inner halo globular cluster NGC 6723. With the discovery of new RR Lyrae variables (RRLs), we obtain P ab = 0.541 ± 0.066 and P c = 0.292 ± 0. We obtain (m − M) 0 = 14.65 ± 0.05, equivalent to a distance from the Sun of 8.47 ± 0.17 kpc, for NGC 6723 from various distance measurement methods using RRLs. We find that RRLs in NGC 6723 do not have magnitude dependency on the radial distance because there is not a severe degree of apparent crowdedness. Finally, we show that a relation exists between the degree of photometric contamination and the apparent crowdedness of the central region of globular cluster systems, |μ − μ r | ∝ log ρ c d 2 . The use of this relation can play a significant role in mitigating the discrepancy in establishing a cosmic distance scale using RRLs in resolved stellar populations in near-field cosmology.