Super-critical X-ray luminosities - The structure and stability of a radiation-supported plasma layer
Abstract
The structure and stability of a plane-parallel Thomson-opaque plasma layer, supported against gravity by radiation and thermal pressures, are examined. The effects of Compton heating by the X-rays incident from below and of thermal bremsstrahlung by the layer itself are taken into account, and an approximate model for the radiative energy transfer is developed. The layer is shown to be dynamically unstable, suggesting that additional stabilizing factors must be present in X-ray sources with steady luminosities substantially exceeding the Eddington limit.
- Publication:
-
Astronomy and Astrophysics
- Pub Date:
- August 1982
- Bibcode:
- 1982A&A...112...24W
- Keywords:
-
- Compton Effect;
- Eddington Approximation;
- Energy Transfer;
- Plasma Layers;
- Radiative Transfer;
- X Ray Sources;
- Bremsstrahlung;
- Luminosity;
- Magnetohydrodynamic Stability;
- Plasma Heating;
- Plasma Temperature;
- Astrophysics