Related papers: Precessing warped accretion discs in X-ray binarie…
Accretion discs are present around both stellar-mass black holes in X-ray binaries and supermassive black holes in active galactic nuclei. A wide variety of circumstantial evidence implies that many of these discs are warped. The standard…
Accretion discs are fundamental to many astrophysical systems, providing the conversion of gravitational potential energy into radiation that we can observe. In many systems there is evidence that discs are warped; from spatially-resolved…
Although during the last decade new observations and new theoretical results have brought better understanding of the physics of accretion onto compact objects, many old and several new questions and problems await answers and solutions. I…
Accretion discs are generally warped. If a warp in a disc is too large, the disc can `break' apart into two or more distinct planes, with only tenuous connections between them. Further if an initially planar disc is subject to a strong…
Recurring outbursts associated with matter flowing onto compact stellar remnants (black-holes, neutron stars, white dwarfs) in close binary systems, provide strong test beds for constraining the poorly understood accretion process. The…
We review our current knowledge of thermal and viscous instabilities in accretion discs around compact objects. We begin with classical disc models based on analytic viscosity prescriptions, discussing physical uncertainties and exploring…
Binary star systems can accrete material originating from a circumbinary disc. Since it is common for the circumbinary disc to be tilted with respect to the binary orbital plane, we test whether the accretion dynamics can be a diagnostic…
Many accretion discs are thought to be warped. Recent hydrodynamical simulations show that (i) discs can break into distinct planes when the amplitude of an imposed warp is sufficiently high and the viscosity sufficiently low, and that (ii)…
Superorbital periods that are observed in the brightness of Be/X-ray binaries may be driven by a misaligned and precessing Be star disc. We examine how the precessing disc model explains the superorbital variation of (i) the magnitude of…
The non-linear fluid dynamics of a warped accretion disc was investigated in an earlier paper by developing a theory of fully non-linear bending waves in a thin, viscous disc. That analysis is here extended to take proper account of thermal…
The origin and stability of a thin sheet of plasma in the magnetosphere of an accreting neutron star is investigated. First the radial extension of such a magnetospheric disc is explored. Then a mechanism for magnetospheric accretion is…
The inner region of the accretion disk around a magnetized star (T Tauri star, white dwarf or neutron star) is subjected to magnetic torques that induce warping and precession of the disk. These torques arise from the interaction between…
In this paper we explore numerically the evolution of a warped accretion disc. Here, we focus here on the regime where the warp evolves diffusively. By comparing the numerical results to a simple diffusion model, we are able to determine…
Observations of distorted discs have highlighted the ubiquity of warps in a variety of astrophysical contexts. This has been complemented by theoretical efforts to understand the dynamics of warp evolution. Despite significant efforts to…
The X-ray light-curves of the recurring outbursts observed in low-mass X-ray binaries provide strong test beds for constraining (still) poorly understood disc-accretion processes. These light-curves act as a powerful diagnostic to probe the…
Astrophysical discs are often warped, that is, their orbital planes change with radius. This occurs whenever there is a non-axisymmetric force acting on the disc, for example the Lense-Thirring precession induced by a misaligned spinning…
An accretion disk around a rotating magnetized star is subjected to magnetic torques which induce disk warping and precession. These torques arise from interactions between the stellar field and the induced surface currents on the disk.…
We study a warping instability of a geometrically thin, non-self-gravitating disk surrounding binary supermassive black holes on a circular orbit. Such a circumbinary disk is subject to not only tidal torques due to the binary gravitational…
Superorbital periods are observed in the optical light curves of many Be/X-ray binaries yet their origin has remained somewhat elusive. We suggest that precession of the spin axis of the Be star can drive superorbital periods, particularly…
A large fraction of stars are in binary systems, yet the evolution of proto-planetary discs in binaries has been little explored from the theoretical side. In this paper we investigate the evolution of the discs surrounding the primary and…