2008/08/26 by M. H. Montgomery, Μ. H. Montgomery, Susan E. Thompson +3
Physics and Astronomy · #Accretion (finance) #Astronomy #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics #Astrophysics and Star Formation Studies #Materials science #Metal #Observable #Physics #Settling #Stars #Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies #Surface (topology) #White dwarf #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/592731
4 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, updated references
arxiv created 2008/08/26 · openalex publication_date 2008/09/09 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Due to the short settling times of metals in DA white dwarf atmospheres, any white dwarfs with photospheric metals must be actively accreting. It is therefore natural to expect that the metals may not be deposited uniformly on the surface of the star. We present calculations showing how the temperature variations associated with white dwarf pulsations lead to an observable diagnostic of the surface metal distribution, and we show what constraints current data sets are able to provide. We also investigate the effect that time-variable accretion has on the metal abundances of different species, and we show how this can lead to constraints on the gravitational settling times.