EDP Sciences Journals List
Advanced Search
Subscriber Authentication Point
Home All issues Volume 407/1 Article
Free access article

Issue A&A
Volume 407, Number 1, August III 2003
Page(s) 265 - 271
Section Stellar atmospheres
DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361:20030830



A&A 407, 265-271 (2003)
DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361:20030830

Thermal state of transiently accreting neutron stars

D. G. Yakovlev1, K. P. Levenfish1 and P. Haensel2

1  Ioffe Physical Technical Institute, Politekhnicheskaya 26, 194021 St.-Petersburg, Russia
2  Copernicus Astronomical Center, Bartycka 18, 00-716 Warsaw, Poland
    e-mail: yak@astro.ioffe.ru, ksen@astro.ioffe.ru, haensel@camk.edu.pl

(Received 3 September 2002 / Accepted 17 April 2003)

Abstract
We study thermal states of transiently accreting neutron stars (with mean accretion rates $\dot{M} \sim 10^{-14}{-}10^{-9}$  $M_\odot$ yr -1) determined by the deep crustal heating of accreted matter sinking into stellar interiors. We formalize a direct correspondence of this problem to the problem of cooling neutron stars. Using a simple toy model we analyze the most important factors which affect the thermal states of accreting stars: a strong superfluidity in the cores of low-mass stars and a fast neutrino emission (in nucleon, pion-condensed, kaon-condensed, or quark phases of dense matter) in the cores of high-mass stars. We briefly compare the results with the observations of soft X-ray transients in quiescence. If the upper limit on the quiescent thermal luminosity of the neutron star in SAX J1808.4-3658 (Campana et al. 2002) is associated with deep crustal heating, it favors the model of nucleon neutron-star cores with switched-on direct Urca process.


Key words: stars: neutron -- dense matter

Offprint request: D. Yakovlev, yak@astro.ioffe.ru

SIMBAD Objects



© ESO 2003


What is OpenURL?

The OpenURL standard is a protocol for transmission of metadata describing the resource that you wish to access. An OpenURL link contains article metadata and directs it to the OpenURL server of your choice. The OpenURL server can provide access to the resource and also offer complementary services (specific search engine, export of references...). The OpenURL link can be generated by different means.
  • If your librarian has set up your subscription with an OpenURL resolver, OpenURL links appear automatically on the abstract pages.
  • You can define your own OpenURL resolver with your EDPS Account. In this case your choice will be given priority over that of your library.
  • You can use an add-on for your browser (Firefox or I.E.) to display OpenURL links on a page (see http://www.openly.com/openurlref/). You should disable this module if you wish to use the OpenURL server that you or your library have defined.