Centrifugally Driven Mass Loss and Outbursts of Massive Stars

Abstract

Rotation and mass loss are crucially interlinked properties of massive stars, strongly affecting their evolution and ultimate fate. Massive stars rotating near their breakup limit shed mass centrifugally, creating Be stars with circumstellar disks and possibly driving outbursts. Using the MESA stellar evolution code, we examine the effects of efficient angular momentum transport on the main sequence and post-main sequence rotational evolution of massive stars. In rapid rotators, angular momentum transported from the contracting core to the expanding envelope can spin up the surface layers past the breakup rate, particularly for stars near (or beyond) the end of the main sequence and in low-metallicity environments. We also demonstrate that centrifugal instabilities could arise in rapidly rotating massive stars, potentially triggering the S Doradus outbursts observed in luminous blue variable stars. Prior mass accretion from a binary companion increases both the likelihood and the intensity of centrifugal mass loss. We discuss implications for massive stellar evolution, Be stars, and luminous blue variables.

18 pages, 13 figures

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• The Stellar Merger Scenario for Black Holes in the Pair-instability Gap
• Wind-envelope interaction as the origin of the slow cyclic brightness variations of luminous blue variables
• Classical OBe Stars as Post-Supernova Runaways: Confirming Binary Origins
• Tracing the evolution of short-period binaries with super-synchronous fast rotators
• Viscous and centrifugal instabilities of massive stars