Related papers: A PIONIER View on Mass-Transferring Red Giants
We define two regimes of the parameter space of symbiotic systems based on the dominant mass transfer mechanism. A wide range of white dwarf (WD) mass, donor mass, and donor radius combinations are explored to determine the separation, for…
Luminous red nova transients, presumably from stellar coalescence, exhibit long-term precursor emission over hundreds of binary orbits, leading to impulsive outbursts with durations similar to a single orbital period. In an effort to…
Seismic data obtained with the space photometric CoRoT and Kepler instruments have led to a unprecendently precise characterization -- in terms of masses and ages -- of a large sample of post main sequence stars (low mass subgiant and red…
Recent observations of supernovae (SNe) have indicated that a fraction of massive stars possess dense circumstellar medium (CSM) at the moment of their core collapses. They suggest the presence of additional activities of the SN progenitor…
Symbiotic stars belong to a group of interacting binaries that display a wide variety of phenomena, including prominent outbursts connected with mass transfer, as well as stellar winds, jets, eclipses, or intrinsic variability of the…
High rates of stable mass transfer likely occur for some binary star systems, but the resulting flow of mass and angular momentum (AM) is unclear. We perform hydrodynamical simulations of a polytropic donor star and a point mass secondary…
We give a global analysis of mass transfer variations in low-mass X-ray binaries and cataclysmic variables whose evolution is driven by the nuclear expansion of the secondary star. We show that limit cycles caused by irradiation of the…
Close double neutron stars have been observed as Galactic radio pulsars, while their mergers have been detected as gamma-ray bursts and gravitational-wave sources. They are believed to have experienced at least one common-envelope episode…
The light curve of GW170817 is surprisingly blue and bright. Assuming that the event is a binary neutron star merger, we argue that blueness and brightness of the light curve is the result of ejecta that contains an substantial amount of…
Red-giant stars are proving to be an incredible source of information for testing models of stellar evolution, as asteroseismology has opened up a window into their interiors. Such insights are a direct result of the unprecedented data from…
The orders of magnitude variation in lithium abundances of evolved stars have long been a puzzle. Diluted signals, ambiguous evolutionary states and unknown masses have made it challenging to both map the expected lithium signals and…
The observed masses, radii and temperatures of 60 medium- to long-period binaries, most of which contain a cool, evolved star and a hotter less-evolved one, are compared with theoretical models which include (a) core convective…
Calculation of the mass transfer (MT) rate $\dot{M}_\text{d}$ of a Roche lobe overflowing star is a fundamental task in binary star evolution theory. Most of the existing MT prescriptions are based on a common set of assumptions that…
Stars are generally spherical, yet their gaseous envelopes often appear non-spherical when ejected near the end of their lives. This quirk is most notable during the planetary nebula phase when these envelopes become ionized. Interactions…
Recent interpretations of narrow, variable absorption lines detected in some Type Ia supernovae suggest that their progenitors are surrounded by dense, circumstellar material. Similar variations detected in the symbiotic recurrent nova…
We conduct three-dimensional hydrodynamical simulations of energy deposition into the envelope of a red giant star as a result of the merger of two close main sequence stars or brown dwarfs, and show that the outcome is a highly…
Symbiotic stars are interacting binary systems with the longest orbital periods. They are typically formed by a white dwarf, a red giant and a nebula. These objects are natural astrophysical laboratories for studying the evolution of…
To measure the onset of mass transfer in eccentric binaries we have developed a two-phase SPH technique. Mass transfer is important in the evolution of close binaries, and a key issue is to determine the separation at which mass transfer…
The detection of mixed modes in red giants with space missions CoRoT and Kepler has revealed their deep internal structure. These modes allow us to characterize the pattern of pressure modes (through the measurement of their asymptotic…
Despite numerous efforts to better understand binary star evolution, some aspects of it remain poorly constrained. In particular, the evolution of eccentric binaries has remained elusive mainly because the Roche lobe formalism derived for…