Eclipse Line Profiles in Cataclysmic Variables: Evidence for Absence of Accretion Disks
Abstract
Emission-line profiles of several cataclysmic variables have been observed through eclipse, and they do not show strong evidence for the rotational signature that is characteristic of an accretion disk. The lines appear to be formed in material that has some rotation with respect to the white dwarf, but that also has a substantial velocity directed radially with respect to the degenerate dwarf. The data are suggestive that the emission lines of many novae and novalike variables may not originate in disks, but in rotating polar accretion columns, and that the existence of a strong magnetic field may be an important parameter for the nova phenomenon.
- Publication:
-
The Astronomical Journal
- Pub Date:
- June 1989
- DOI:
- 10.1086/115115
- Bibcode:
- 1989AJ.....97.1752W
- Keywords:
-
- Accretion Disks;
- Cataclysmic Variables;
- Eclipsing Binary Stars;
- Line Spectra;
- Emission Spectra;
- H Beta Line;
- Novae;
- Stellar Magnetic Fields;
- White Dwarf Stars;
- Astrophysics;
- STARS: DWARF NOVAE