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Title:
Disk-Anchored Magnetic Propellers - A Cure for the SW Sex Syndrome
Authors:
Horne, Keith
Affiliation:
AA(Physics & Astronomy, University of St. Andrews, KY16 9SS, Scotland, U.K., )
Publication:
Annapolis Workshop on Magnetic Cataclysmic Variables, ASP Conference Series, Volume 157, edited by Coel Hellier and Koji Mukai, 1999, p. 349
Publication Date:
00/1999
Origin:
AUTHOR
Keywords:
AE AQR, SW SEX, ACCRETION DISKS, NOVA-LIKE VARIABLES, MAGNETIC PROPELLERS
Bibliographic Code:
1999ASPC..157..349H

Abstract

In AE Aqr, magnetic fields transfer energy and angular momentum from a rapidly-spinning white dwarf to material in the gas stream from the companion star, with the effect of spinning down the white dwarf while flinging the gas stream material out of the binary system. This magnetic propeller produces a host of observable signatures, chief among which are broad, single-peaked, flaring emission lines with phase-shifted orbital kinematics. SW Sex stars have accretion disks, but also broad, single-peaked, phase-shifted emission lines similar to those seen in AE Aqr. We propose that a magnetic propeller similar to that which operates in AE Aqr is also at work in SW Sex stars - and to some extent in all nova-like systems. The propeller is anchored in the inner accretion disk, rather than, or in addition to, the white dwarf. Energy and angular momentum are thereby extracted from the inner disk and transferred to gas-stream material flowing above the disk, which is consequently pitched out of the system. This provides a non-local, dissipationless angular-momentum-extraction mechanism, which should result in cool inner disks with temperature profiles flatter than T propto R^{-3/4}, as observed in eclipse mapping studies of nova-like variables. The disk-anchored magnetic propeller model appears to explain qualitatively most if not all of the peculiar features of the SW Sex syndrome.

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