Vertical Structure of the Outer Accretion Disk in Persistent Low-Mass X-Ray Binaries

TL;DR

This study models how X-ray irradiation influences the vertical structure of outer accretion disks in low-mass X-ray binaries, revealing significant heating effects and providing analytic formulas for disk heating by scattered X-ray photons.

Contribution

It presents a self-consistent calculation of the vertical structure and X-ray transfer in accretion disks, including analytic formulas for X-ray heating effects.

Findings

X-ray photons significantly influence disk structure at large radii.

Extended atmospheric layers enhance X-ray heating effects.

Derived analytic formulas approximate disk heating with over 10% accuracy.

Abstract

We have investigated the influence of X-ray irradiation on the vertical structure of the outer accretion disk in low-mass X-ray binaries by performing a self-consistent calculation of the vertical structure and X-ray radiation transfer in the disk. Penetrating deep into the disk, the field of scattered X-ray photons with energy $E\gtrsim10$\,keV exerts a significant influence on the vertical structure of the accretion disk at a distance $R\gtrsim10^{10}$\,cm from the neutron star. At a distance $R\sim10^{11}$\,cm, where the total surface density in the disk reaches $\Sigma_0\sim20$\,g\,cm$^{-2}$, X-ray heating affects all layers of an optically thick disk. The X-ray heating effect is enhanced significantly in the presence of an extended atmospheric layer with a temperature $T_{atm}\sim(2\div3)\times10^6$\,K above the accretion disk. We have derived simple analytic formulas for the disk heating by scattered X-ray photons using an approximate solution of the transfer equation by the Sobolev method. This approximation has a $\gtrsim10$\,% accuracy in the range of X-ray photon energies $E<20$\,keV.