Thermal Stability of White Dwarfs Accreting Hydrogen-rich Matter and Progenitors of Type Ia Supernovae

By Ken'ichi Nomoto, H. Saio, M. Kato, I. Hachisu. 2006

183 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We revisit the properties of white dwarfs accreting hydrogen-rich matter, by constructing steady state models in which hydrogen shell burning consumes hydrogen at the same rate as the white dwarf accretes it. We obtain steady models for various accretion rates and white dwarf masses. We confirm that these are thermally stable only when the accretion rate is higher than ~10-7 M☉ yr-1. We show that recent models of quiescent "surface hydrogen burning" for a much wider range of accretion rates result from the use of too large a zone mass in the outer part of the models; hydrogen burning must occur in a much thinner layer. A comparison of the positions on the H-R diagram suggests that most of the luminous supersoft X-ray sources are white dwarfs accreting matter at rates high enough that the hydrogen-burning shell is thermally stable. Implications for the progenitors of Type Ia supernovae are discussed.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/c9fad81c67fe0ff7cc169c0f304293c3eab100ad

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Citations in the corpus

• Common envelope evolution: where we stand and how we can move forward (2012, background): “…super-Eddington rates (Begelman 1979; Houck and Chevalier 1991; King and Begelman 1999), or reincarnation of an accreting white dwarf which tries to form a red giant (Nomoto et al. 1979; Nomoto et al. 2007); or perhaps even in nova systems when the expansion of the nova shell engulfs the companion.”
• MODULES FOR EXPERIMENTS IN STELLAR ASTROPHYSICS (MESA): BINARIES, PULSATIONS, AND EXPLOSIONS (2015, background): “For WDs there is a limited range of accretion rates for stable hydrogen burning (Nomoto et al. 2007; Shen & Bildsten 2007).”
• EVLA OBSERVATIONS CONSTRAIN THE ENVIRONMENT AND PROGENITOR SYSTEM OF Type Ia SUPERNOVA 2011fe (2012, background): “…progenitor scenarios span a wide parameter space (Hillebrandt & Niemeyer 2000), most scenarios may be characterized by the WD’s accretion rate, Ṁacc, and efficiency of accretion, ǫacc, such that the rate of mass lost into the local environs is Ṁloss = (1 − ǫacc)Ṁacc (Nomoto et al. 2007).”
• The Horizon-AGN simulation: evolution of galaxy properties over cosmic time (2016, methodology): “The chemical yields for Type Ia explosions are taken from the W7 model of Nomoto et al. (2007).”
• Observational Clues to the Progenitors of Type Ia Supernovae (2013, background): “Nielsen et al. (2013a), Nomoto et al. (2007), Wheeler & Pooley (2013), and Lepo & van Kerkwijk (2013) have considered the possible appearances of such “rapidly accreting WDs”, and argued that they might appear as undersized OB stars, i.e. with effective temperatures of 104.5−5K, but with sizes of…”
• THE LONG-TERM EVOLUTION OF DOUBLE WHITE DWARF MERGERS (2011, background): “However, it has been known for decades (Sienkiewicz 1980; Fujimoto 1982; Paczyński 1983) and recently confirmed (Yoon et al. 2004; Shen & Bildsten 2007; Nomoto et al. 2007) that the range of accretion rates that allow for stable Hburning is very narrow.”
• On the Progenitors of Type Ia Supernovae (2018, unknown): “Simulations show that steady burning is obtained for accretion rates in the relatively narrow range of (a few) ×10−8 M yr−1 to (a few) ×10−7 M yr−1 (e.g., Nomoto et al. 2007; Wolf et al. 2013; Hillman et al. 2016).”
• RATES AND DELAY TIMES OF TYPE Ia SUPERNOVAE (2009, background): “…growth of WDs, employing accretor mass-dependent accumulation efficiencies which may lead to nova explosions, stable burning, or optically thick WD winds (Nomoto et al. 2007; Kato & Hachisu 2004; Hachisu et al. 1999; Kato & Hachisu 1999; Prialnik & Kovetz 1995; Hashimoto et al. 1986, see below).”
• HYDROGEN BURNING ON ACCRETING WHITE DWARFS: STABILITY, RECURRENT NOVAE, AND THE POST-NOVA SUPERSOFT PHASE (2013, methodology): “Again, this profile is from the quiescent (pre-nova) state. in Figure 1 is largely consistent with these results and plot our results along with those of Nomoto et al. (2007) and Shen & Bildsten (2007).”
• SUB-CHANDRASEKHAR WHITE DWARF MERGERS AS THE PROGENITORS OF TYPE Ia SUPERNOVAE (2010, background): “If it is faster, hydrogen burns stably, but only a small range avoids expansion and mass loss (Nomoto et al. 2007).”