Physics – Plasma Physics
Scientific paper
Nov 1998
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1998aps..dpp.a1r01l&link_type=abstract
American Physical Society, Division of Plasma Physics Meeting, November 16-20, 1998 New Orleans, LA, abstract #A1R.01
Physics
Plasma Physics
Scientific paper
Macroscopic and Microscopic plasma processes govern the properties and evolution of accreting magnetic stars. In this review I will focus on protostars, white dwarfs, and neutron stars. Gas accreting onto these stars is typically highly ionized and flattened into a geometrically thin disk. Interaction of the disk plasma with the star's magnetic field via processes such as ambipolar diffusion, magnetic flux reconnection, and MHD turbulence governs the transport of mass, energy, and angular momentum near the star, determining its mass, luminosity, and spin evolution. Magnetospheric processes produce outward moving plasma bubbles and jets, accelerate charged particles to energies up to 10^12 eV, and generate quasi-periodic brightness oscillations (QPOs). In some neutron stars, beam-target interactions of protons moving at 0.5c in 10^12 G magnetic fields heat the stellar surface to temperatures of 10-100 keV. Interaction of the escaping electromagnetic radiation with the accreting plasma produces QPOs and forms the observed spectrum of these stars. The recent discovery that many accreting neutron stars produce QPOs with frequencies of about 1 khz provides an unparalled opportunity to study plasma dynamics and radiation processes in strongly curved spacetimes.
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