Accretion disks in interacting binaries: Simulations of the stream-disk impact

Abstract

We investigate the impact between the gas stream from the inner Lagrangian point and the accretion disk in interacting binaries, using three dimensional Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics simulations. We find that a significant fraction of the stream material can ricochet off the disk edge and overflow towards smaller radii, and that this generates pronounced non-axisymmetric structure in the absorption column towards the central object. We discuss the implications of our results for observations and time-dependent models of low-mass X-ray binaries, cataclysmic variables and supersoft X-ray sources.

LaTeX (aaspp.sty), 19 pages including 7 of 8 figures. The paper and remaining figure are also available at http://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/~parm/lmxb.html . ApJ in press