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Does the Mass Accretion Rate Depend on the Radius of the Accreting Star?

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2001

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10.1086/318913

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American Astronomical Society
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Loeb, Abraham, Ramesh Narayan, and John C. Raymond. 2001. “Does the Mass Accretion Rate Depend on the Radius of the Accreting Star?” The Astrophysical Journal 547 (2): L151–54. https://doi.org/10.1086/318913.

Abstract

In some circumstances, the mass accretion rate (M) over dot () onto a compact star may depend not only on external boundary conditions but also on the radius R- of the accreting star. Writing the dependence as M-* proportional to R-(p), we estimate p for transient binary systems in a quiescent state. We use the observed luminosities L of binary accreting white dwarfs (R- similar to 10(9) cm) and neutron stars (R-* similar to 10(6) cm) under similar quiescent conditions and estimate M-* in each system through the relation L approximate to GM()M()/R-, where M- is the mass of the star. From the limited data available, we infer that p similar to 0.9 +/- 0.5 for quiescent binaries. This radial dependence is consistent with radiatively inefficient accretion flows that either are convective or lose mass via a wind.

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http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:41384934

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