Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics – Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Scientific paper
2011-08-24
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
To appear in the Proceedings of the 2nd International Symposium on Strong Electromagnetic Fields and Neutron Stars, Varadero,
Scientific paper
Since their initial discovery, the origin of isolated white dwarfs (WDs) with magnetic fields in excess of $\sim$1 MG has remained a mystery. Recently, the formation of these high-field magnetic WDs has been observationally linked to strong binary interactions incurred during post-main-sequence evolution. Planetary, brown dwarf or stellar companions located within a few AU of main-sequence stars may become engulfed during the primary's expansion off the main sequence. Sufficiently low-mass companions in-spiral inside a common envelope until they are tidally shredded near the natal white dwarf. Formation of an accretion disk from the disrupted companion provides a source of turbulence and shear which act to amplify magnetic fields and transport them to the WD surface. We show that these disk-generated fields explain the observed range of magnetic field strengths for isolated, high-field magnetic WDs. Additionally, we discuss a high-mass binary analogue which generates a strongly-magnetized WD core inside a pre-collapse, massive star. Subsequent core-collapse to a neutron star may produce a magnetar.
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