Soft X-ray emission from dwarf novae.
Abstract
Dwarf novae are binary systems in which material is being transferred from a low-mass main-sequence star via an accretion disk to a white dwarf companion. The two suggested regions of soft X-ray production are the 'hot spot' where the stream of transferred matter strikes the disk and the boundary layer where the accretion disk grazes the surface of the white dwarf. These two possibilities are investigated, and it is concluded that the 'hot spot' gives rise to little or no soft X-ray emission, whereas the boundary layer can emit up to half the accretion luminosity as soft X-rays. The structure of the boundary layer is of relevance to other stellar systems which contain an accretion disk.
- Publication:
-
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Pub Date:
- January 1977
- DOI:
- 10.1093/mnras/178.2.195
- Bibcode:
- 1977MNRAS.178..195P
- Keywords:
-
- Binary Stars;
- Companion Stars;
- Novae;
- Stellar Luminosity;
- White Dwarf Stars;
- X Ray Sources;
- Black Body Radiation;
- Boundary Layers;
- Disks (Shapes);
- Main Sequence Stars;
- Stellar Mass;
- Stellar Structure;
- Stellar Systems;
- Astrophysics