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Title: The landscape of disc outflows from black hole–neutron star mergers

Abstract

We investigate mass ejection from accretion discs formed in mergers of black holes (BHs) and neutron stars (NSs). The third observing run of the LIGO/Virgo interferometers provided BH–NS candidate events that yielded no electromagnetic (EM) counterparts. The broad range of disc configurations expected from BH–NS mergers motivates a thorough exploration of parameter space to improve EM signal predictions. Here we conduct 27 high-resolution, axisymmetric, long-term hydrodynamic simulations of the viscous evolution of BH accretion discs that include neutrino emission/absorption effects and post-processing with a nuclear reaction network. In the absence of magnetic fields, these simulations provide a lower limit to the fraction of the initial disc mass ejected. We find a nearly linear inverse dependence of this fraction on disc compactness (BH mass over initial disc radius). The dependence is related to the fraction of the disc mass accreted before the ouflow is launched, which depends on the disc position relative to the innermost stable circular orbit. We also characterize a trend of decreasing ejected fraction and decreasing lanthanide/actinide content with increasing disc mass at fixed BH mass. Furthermore, this trend results from a longer time to reach weak freezout and an increasingly dominant role of neutrino absorption at highermore » disc masses. We estimate the radioactive luminosity from the disc outflow alone available to power kilonovae over the range of configurations studied, finding a spread of two orders of magnitude. For most of the BH–NS parameter space, the disc outflow contribution is well below the kilonova mass upper limits for GW190814.« less

Authors:
ORCiD logo [1];  [2];  [3]
  1. Department of Physics, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E1, Canada
  2. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of New Hampshire, Durham, NH 03824, USA
  3. CCS-2, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545, USA, Center for Theoretical Astrophysics, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545, USA
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Univ. of New Hampshire, Durham, NH (United States); Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Nuclear Physics (NP); National Science Foundation (NSF); National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
OSTI Identifier:
1647478
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1681208; OSTI ID: 1784949; OSTI ID: 1844131
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-20-23877
Journal ID: ISSN 0035-8711
Grant/Contract Number:  
SC0020435; PHY-1806278; 80NSSC18K0565; AC02-05CH11231; 89233218CNA000001
Resource Type:
Published Article
Journal Name:
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Name: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Journal Volume: 497 Journal Issue: 3; Journal ID: ISSN 0035-8711
Publisher:
Royal Astronomical Society
Country of Publication:
United Kingdom
Language:
English
Subject:
79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS; Accretion; accretion discs; dense matter; gravitational waves; hydrodynamics; neutrinos; nuclear reactions; nucleosynthesis; abundances

Citation Formats

Fernández, Rodrigo, Foucart, Francois, and Lippuner, Jonas. The landscape of disc outflows from black hole–neutron star mergers. United Kingdom: N. p., 2020. Web. doi:10.1093/mnras/staa2209.
Fernández, Rodrigo, Foucart, Francois, & Lippuner, Jonas. The landscape of disc outflows from black hole–neutron star mergers. United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa2209
Fernández, Rodrigo, Foucart, Francois, and Lippuner, Jonas. Tue . "The landscape of disc outflows from black hole–neutron star mergers". United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa2209.
@article{osti_1647478,
title = {The landscape of disc outflows from black hole–neutron star mergers},
author = {Fernández, Rodrigo and Foucart, Francois and Lippuner, Jonas},
abstractNote = {We investigate mass ejection from accretion discs formed in mergers of black holes (BHs) and neutron stars (NSs). The third observing run of the LIGO/Virgo interferometers provided BH–NS candidate events that yielded no electromagnetic (EM) counterparts. The broad range of disc configurations expected from BH–NS mergers motivates a thorough exploration of parameter space to improve EM signal predictions. Here we conduct 27 high-resolution, axisymmetric, long-term hydrodynamic simulations of the viscous evolution of BH accretion discs that include neutrino emission/absorption effects and post-processing with a nuclear reaction network. In the absence of magnetic fields, these simulations provide a lower limit to the fraction of the initial disc mass ejected. We find a nearly linear inverse dependence of this fraction on disc compactness (BH mass over initial disc radius). The dependence is related to the fraction of the disc mass accreted before the ouflow is launched, which depends on the disc position relative to the innermost stable circular orbit. We also characterize a trend of decreasing ejected fraction and decreasing lanthanide/actinide content with increasing disc mass at fixed BH mass. Furthermore, this trend results from a longer time to reach weak freezout and an increasingly dominant role of neutrino absorption at higher disc masses. We estimate the radioactive luminosity from the disc outflow alone available to power kilonovae over the range of configurations studied, finding a spread of two orders of magnitude. For most of the BH–NS parameter space, the disc outflow contribution is well below the kilonova mass upper limits for GW190814.},
doi = {10.1093/mnras/staa2209},
journal = {Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society},
number = 3,
volume = 497,
place = {United Kingdom},
year = {Tue Jul 28 00:00:00 EDT 2020},
month = {Tue Jul 28 00:00:00 EDT 2020}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
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https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staa2209

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