Hydrodynamic Instability and Coalescence of Neutron Star Binaries

Details Hydrodynamic Instability and Coalescence of Neutron Star Binaries Hydrodynamic Instability and Coalescence of Neutron Star Binaries

Dec 1992

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1992aas...181.6612r&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, 181st AAS Meeting, #66.12; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 24, p.1226

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

Hydrostatic equilibrium configurations for close neutron star binaries can become unstable. The stability limit for circular orbits occurs at the orbital separation that simultaneously minimizes the total equilibrium energy and angular momentum in the system. The occurrence of such a minimum is a purely Newtonian hydrodynamic effect resulting from tidal interactions. Its existence is independent of the degree of synchronization in the system. For sufficiently homogeneous stars, with effective adiabatic index Gamma >Gamma_ {crit}, the minimum occurs before the surfaces come into contact. Using an energy variational method to construct the equilibrium binary configurations, we find that Gamma_ {crit}~ 1.5 for a synchronized system and Gamma_ {crit}~1.8 for an irrotational system. The development of an instability can drastically affect the terminal evolution of a close neutron star binary whose orbit is decaying by gravitational wave emission. Indeed, the instability causes a rapid acceleration of the coalescence, such that the radial infall velocity at contact is much larger than would be predicted if the stars behaved like point masses. Work supported in part by NSF Grant AST 90--15451 and NASA Grant NAGW--2364 to Cornell University. F. A. R. thanks NASA and STScI for financial support through a Hubble fellowship award.

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