Related papers: Sedimentation and Type I X-ray Bursts at Low Accre…
Neutron stars, with their strong surface gravity, have interestingly short timescales for the sedimentation of heavy elements. Recent observations of unstable thermonuclear burning (observed as X-ray bursts) on the surfaces of slowly…
The stability of thermonuclear burning of hydrogen and helium accreted onto neutron stars is strongly dependent on the mass accretion rate. The burning behavior is observed to change from Type I X-ray bursts to stable burning, with…
I review our understanding of the thermonuclear instabilities on accreting neutron stars that produce Type I X-Ray bursts. I emphasize those observational and theoretical aspects that should interest the broad audience of this meeting. The…
During accretion, a neutron star (NS) is spun up as angular momentum is transported through its liquid surface layers. We study the resulting differentially rotating profile, focusing on the impact this has for type I X-ray bursts. The…
Multi-zone models of Type I X-ray bursts are presented that use an adaptive nuclear reaction network of unprecedented size, up to 1300 isotopes. Sequences of up to 15 bursts are followed for two choices of accretion rate and metallicity. At…
During accretion a neutron star (NS) is spun up as angular momentum is transported through its surface layers. We study the resulting differentially rotating profile, focusing on the impact this has for type I X-ray bursts. The predominant…
We use the two-zone model of Cooper & Narayan to study the onset and time evolution of hydrogen-triggered type I X-ray bursts on accreting neutron stars. At the lowest accretion rates, thermally unstable hydrogen burning ignites helium as…
We construct a two-zone model to describe H and He burning on the surface of an accreting neutron star and use it to study the triggering of type I X-ray bursts. Although highly simplified, the model reproduces all of the bursting regimes…
Neutron stars in mass-transferring binaries are accreting the hydrogen and helium rich matter from the surfaces of their companions. This article simply explains the physics associated with how that material eventually fuses to form heavier…
We investigate the atmosphere, ocean, and crust of neutron stars accreting at rates sufficiently high (typically in excess of the local Eddington limit) to stabilize the burning of accreted hydrogen and helium. For hydrogen-rich accretion…
We investigate the latitude at which type I X-ray bursts are ignited on rapidly rotating accreting neutron stars. We find that, for a wide range of accretion rates, ignition occurs preferentially at the equator, in accord with the work of…
We have assembled a sample of 1187 thermonuclear (type-I) X-ray bursts from 48 accreting neutron stars by the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer, spanning more than ten years. The sample contains examples of two of the three theoretical ignition…
Material accreted onto a neutron star can stably burn in steady state only when the accretion rate is high (typically super-Eddington) or if a large flux from the neutron star crust permeates the outer atmosphere. For such situations we…
The excess of the rate of type I X-ray bursts over that expected when the matter fallen between bursts completely burns out in a thermonuclear explosion is explained in terms of the model of a spreading layer of matter coming from the…
We show that burning of a small mass fraction of carbon in a neutron star ocean is thermally unstable at low accumulated masses when the ocean contains heavy ashes from the hydrogen burning rapid proton (rp) process. The key to early…
We report the detection during the JEM-X/INTEGRAL observations of several X-ray bursters of series of close type I X-ray bursts consisting of two or three events with a recurrence time much shorter than the characteristic (at the observed…
We measured the thermonuclear burning efficiency as a function of accretion rate for the Type I X-ray bursts of five low-mass X-ray binary systems. We chose sources with measured neutron star spins and a substantial population of bursts…
Superbursts from accreting neutron stars probe nuclear reactions at extreme densities ($\rho \approx 10^{9}~g\,cm^{-3}$) and temperatures ($T>10^9~K$). These bursts ($\sim$1000 times more energetic than type I X-ray bursts) are most likely…
The effects of a new triple-$\alpha$ reaction rate (OKK rate) on the helium flash of a helium accreting neutron star in a binary system have been investigated. Since the ignition points determine the properties of a thermonuclear flash of…
We investigate the effect of a new triple-alpha reaction rate from Ogata et al. (2009) on helium ignition conditions on accreting neutron stars and on the properties of the subsequent type I X-ray burst. We find that the new rate leads to…