Interacting Binaries No. 28, May 1st, 2007 An Electronic Newsletter Editors: Boris T. Gansicke¨ Dept. of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK Andrew J. Norton Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, The Open University, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK [email protected], http://astrocat.org/ibnews Contents 1 Editorial 2 2 Abstracts of refereed papers 3 – HS1857+5144: A hot and young pre-cataclysmic variable Aungwerojwit et al. ............. 3 – Analysis of the first confirmed superoutburst of V337 Cygni in 2006 May Boyd et al. ......... 3 – Spitzer Space Telescope observations of magnetic cataclysmic variables: possibilities for the presence of dust in polars Brinkworth et al ................................... 4 – ULTRACAM: an ultra-fast, triple-beam CCD camera for high-speed astrophysics Dhillon et al .... 4 – On the abundances of GRO J1655-40 Foellmi, Dall & Depagne ..................... 5 – Evolution of Close White Dwarf Binaries Gokhale, Xiao & Frank .................... 5 – SDSS J102146.44+234926.3:New WZ Sge-type dwarf nova Golovin et al. ............... 6 – Cool companions to white dwarf stars from the Two Micron All Sky Survey All Sky Data Re- lease Hoard et al ............................................ 6 – Formation of relativistic jets by collapsing stars to black holes Kryvdyk ................. 7 – A Synthetic Spectrum and Light Curve Analysis of the Cataclysmic Variable IX Velorum Linnell et al. 7 – IGR J16194−2810: a new symbiotic X–ray binary Masetti et al. .................... 8 – Hydrodynamic and Spectral Simulations of HMXB Winds Mauche et al ................ 8 – Astrophysics of white dwarf binaries Nelemans ............................. 8 – New periodic variable stars coincident with ROSAT sources discovered using SuperWASP Norton et al 9 – Long-term monitoring of the short period SU UMa-type dwarf nova, V844 Herculis Oizumi et al. ... 10 – Emission Line Flickering from the Secondary Star in Cataclysmic Variables? A study of V3885 Sagi- tarii Ribeiro & Diaz .......................................... 10 – SW Sextantis stars: the dominant population of CVs with orbital periods between 3–4hours Rod´ıguez- Gil et al. ................................................. 11 – XMM-Newtonobservationsof EF Eridani: the textbookexample of low-accretion rate polars Schwope et al ................................................... 12 – Equipotential Surfaces and Lagrangian Points in Non-synchronous, Eccentric Binary and Planetary Systems Sepinsky, Willems & Kalogera ................................ 12 – Spectroscopy of Nine Cataclysmic Variable Stars Sheets et al ...................... 13 – On the effect of emission lines on the UBVR photometry Skopal .................... 13 – Comprehensive simulations of superhumps Smith et al. ......................... 14 – SDSSJ233325.92+152222.1 and the evolution of intermediate polars Southworth et al ........ 14 – Cataclysmic Variables from SDSS VI. The Sixth Year (2005) Szkody et al ............... 15 – On the orbital period of the magnetic Cataclysmic Variable HS 0922+1333 Tovmassian & Zharikov .. 15 3 Abstracts of theses 16 – Mass Transfer and Evolution of Compact Binary Stars Gokhale ..................... 16 1 EDITORIAL 2 4 As seen onastro-ph 16 4.1 CataclysmicVariablesandrelatedsystems . .................... 16 4.2 LMXBsandrelatedsystems . ............ 19 4.3 HMXBsandrelatedsystems . ............ 22 4.4 ULXsandextragalacticXRBs . ............. 24 4.5 Accretiondiscsandaccretiontheory . .................. 24 4.6 Mergers,SNIa,andaccretioninducedcollapse. ..................... 25 4.7 Radiopulsarsinbinaries(andotherwise). .................... 25 4.8 Magnetars:AXPsandSGRs . ........... 26 4.9 Otherbinarysystems .............................. ............ 27 1 Editorial Dear IB friends, Welcome to this edition of the Interacting Binaries Newsletter. Like the last one, this edition appears only 3 months after the previous edition so hopefully the abstracts of the papers listed here are still fresh. It’s also nice to see some new contributors to the newsletter – we hope you continue to find this to be a useful resource. As always, we’re on the look out for as many articles as possible in each issue, so if any of your colleagues are not in the habit of sending in abstracts, please encourage them to do so for the next edition, which will be in another 3 months or so. The astro-ph listing in this edition would normally have been quite short, but owing to a production error last time, we include here 6 months’ worth of abstracts for your perusal – see that section of this newsletter for details! As always: happy reading, Boris Gansicke¨ & Andy Norton Download/Website: http://www.warwick.ac.uk/staff/Boris.Gaensicke/IBNews/ Contact: [email protected] 2 ABSTRACTS OF REFEREED PAPERS 3 2 Abstracts of refereed papers HS1857+5144: A hot and young pre-cataclysmic variable A. Aungwerojwit1,2,B.T.Gansicke¨ 1, P.Rodr´ıguez-Gil3, H.-J. Hagen4, O. Giannakis5, C. Papadimitriou5, C. Allende Prieto6, D. Engels4 1 Department of Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, CV4 7AL, UK 2 Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, Naresuan University, Phitsanulok, 65000, Thailand 3 Instituto de Astrof´ısica de Canarias, 38200 La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain 4 Hamburger Sternwarte, Universit¨at Hamburg, Gojenbergsweg 112, 21029 Hamburg, Germany 5 Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics, National Observatory of Athens, P.O. Box 20048, Athens 11810, Greece 6 McDonald Observatory and Department of Astronomy, University of Texas, Austin, TX 78712, USA Astronomy & Astrophysics, in press (arXiv:0704.1780) We report the discovery of a new white dwarf/M dwarf binary, HS1857+5144, identified in the Hamburg Quasar Survey (HQS). Time-resolved optical spectroscopy and photometry were carried out to determine the properties of this new cataclysmic variable progenitor (pre-CV). The light curves of HS1857+5144 display a sinusoidal variation with a period of Porb = 383.52min and peak-to-peak amplitudes of 0.7mag and 1.1mag in the B-band and R-band, respectively. The large amplitude of the brightness variation results from a reflection effect on the heated inner hemisphere of the companion star, suggesting a very high temperature of the white dwarf. Our radial velocity study confirms the photometric period as the orbital period of the system. A model atmosphere fit to the spectrum of the white dwarf obtained at minimum light provides limits to its mass and temperature of Mwd ≃ 0.6 − 1.0M⊙ and Twd ≃ 70000 − 100000K, respectively. The detection of HeII λ 4686 absorption classifies the primary star of HS1857+5144as a DAO white dwarf. Combiningthe results from our spectroscopy and photometry,we estimate the ◦ ◦ mass of the companion star and the binary inclination to be Msec ≃ 0.15 − 0.30 M⊙ and i ≃ 45 − 55 , respectively. We classify HS1857+5144 as one of the youngest pre-CV known to date. The cooling age of the white dwarf suggests that the present system has just emerged from a common envelope phase ∼ 105 yr ago. HS1857+5144will start mass transfer within or below the 2–3h period gap. Download/Website: http://uk.arxiv.org/abs/0704.1780 Contact: [email protected] Analysis of the first confirmed superoutburst of V337 Cygni in 2006 May D. Boyd1, T. Krajci2, J. Shears3, G. Poyner4 1 5 Silver Lane, West Challow, Wantage, Oxon, OX12 9TX, UK 2 PO Box 1351 Cloudcroft, New Mexico 88317, USA 3 ”Pemberton”, School Lane, Bunbury, Tarporley, Cheshire, CW6 9NR, UK 4 67 Ellerton Road, Kingstanding, Birmingham, B44 0QE, UK Journal of the British Astronomical Association, in press (astro-ph/0702607), During 2006 May the first confirmed superoutburst of the dwarf nova V337 Cygni was observed using unfiltered CCD photometry. The outburst reached a peak magnitude of 15.2 on May 22 and lasted 13 days before the ob- ject returned to quiescence at around magnitude 20. Time-series photometry revealed superhumps with a period of 0.07012 +/- 0.00033d and amplitude 0.1 magnitude, thereby establishing for the first time its UGSU classifica- tion. Astrometry of V337 Cyg in outburst determined an accurate position and enabled the identity of the star in quiescence to be confirmed. Download/Website: http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0702607 Contact: [email protected] 2 ABSTRACTS OF REFEREED PAPERS 4 Spitzer Space Telescope observations of magnetic cataclysmic variables: possibilities for the presence of dust in polars C. S. Brinkworth1, D. W. Hoard1, S. Wachter1, S. B. Howell2, David R. Ciardi3, P. Szkody4, T. E. Harrison5, G. T. van Belle3, A. A. Esin6 1 Spitzer Science Center, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA 2 WIYN Observatory/National Optical Astronomy Observatory, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA 3 Michelson Science Center, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA 4 Department of Astronomy, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195-1580, USA 5 Department of Astronomy, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA 6 Department of Physics, Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, CA 91711-5990, USA The Astrophysical Journal, published (2007ApJ...659.1541B) We present Spitzer Space Telescope photometry of six short-period polars, EF Eri, V347 Pav, VV Pup, V834 Cen, GG Leo, and MR Ser. We have combined the Spitzer Infrared Array Camera (3.6–8.0 µm) data with the 2MASS JHKs photometry to construct the spectral energy distributions of these systems from the near- to mid-IR (1.235–8 µm). We find that five out of the six polars have flux densities in the mid-IR that are substantially in excess of the values expected from the stellar