Hydrogen Burning on Magnetar Surfaces

Details Hydrogen Burning on Magnetar Surfaces Hydrogen Burning on Magnetar Surfaces

2004-10-18

arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0410403v1

Astrophys.J.616:L147-L150,2004

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

4 pages, 2 figures, To be published in ApJ Letters

Scientific paper

10.1086/426789

We compute the rate of diffusive nuclear burning for hydrogen on the surface of a "magnetar" (Soft Gamma-Ray Repeater or Anomalous X-Ray Pulsar). We find that hydrogen at the photosphere will be burned on an extremely rapid timescale of hours to years, depending on composition of the underlying material. Improving on our previous studies, we explore the effect of a maximally thick "inert" helium layer, previously thought to slow down the burning rate. Since hydrogen diffuses faster in helium than through heavier elements, we find this helium buffer actually increases the burning rate for magnetars. We compute simple analytic scalings of the burning rate with temperature and magnetic field for a range of core temperature. We conclude that magnetar photospheres are very unlikely to contain hydrogen. This motivates theoretical work on heavy element atmospheres that are needed to measure effective temperature from the observed thermal emission and constrains models of AXPs that rely on magnetar cooling through thick light element envelopes.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Hydrogen Burning on Magnetar Surfaces does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Hydrogen Burning on Magnetar Surfaces, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Hydrogen Burning on Magnetar Surfaces will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-398679