Mass-loss solutions of massive stars.

Envelopes of massive stars suffering radiatively driven steady mass-loss are numerically investigated to examine a mechanism of mass loss at large rates, such as observed in Eta Car. For massive stars of 100 solar masses, steadily mass-losing envelopes at rates around 0.01 solar mass/yr are constructed. It is shown that steady mass-loss solutions can be obtained in which the flows attain high velocities exceeding the escape velocities at sufficiently large radii. However, it is also shown that the obtained solutions contradict the assumption of steadiness of the flows and that they have no physically consistent counterparts as expected from the static stellar structures of evolved stars.