Document Type

Article

Publication Date

12-1-2021

Publication Title

Astrophysical Journal Letters

Volume

922

Issue

2

First page number:

1

Last page number:

6

Abstract

Type I Be/X-ray binary outbursts are driven by mass transfer from a Be star decretion disk to a neutron star companion during each orbital period. Treiber et al. recently observed nonperiodic type I outbursts in RX J0529.8-6556 that has unknown binary orbital properties. We show that nonperiodic type I outbursts may be temporarily driven in a low eccentricity binary with a disk that is inclined sufficiently to be mildly unstable to Kozai-Lidov oscillations. The inclined disk becomes eccentric and material is transferred to the neutron star at up to three locations in each orbit: when the neutron star passes the disk apastron or one of the two nodes of the disk. The timing and magnitude of each vary with the disk argument of periapsis and longitude of the ascending node that precess in opposite directions. Calculating the orbital period of the RX J0529.8-6556 system is nontrivial but we suggest it may be >300 days, longer than previous estimates.

Controlled Subject

Astrophysics

Disciplines

Astrophysics and Astronomy

File Format

pdf

File Size

642 KB

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Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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