Advection-dominated accretion flow for the varied transition luminosities in black hole X-ray binaries

Abstract

Observationally, two main spectral states, i.e., the low/hard state and the high/soft state, are identified in black hole X-ray binaries (BH-XRBs). Meanwhile, the transitions between the two states are often observed. In this paper, we re-investigate the transition luminosities in the framework of the self-similar solution of the advection-dominated accretion flow (ADAF). Specifically, we search for the critical mass accretion rate ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{crit}}$ of ADAF for different radii $r$ respectively. It is found that ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{crit}}$ decreases with decreasing $r$. By testing the effects of BH mass $m$, the magnetic parameter $\beta$ and the viscosity parameter $\alpha$, it is found that only $\alpha$ has significant effects on ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{crit}}-r$ relation. We define the minimum ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{crit}}$ (roughly at the innermost stable circular orbit) as the hard-to-soft transition rate ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{tr}:\mathrm{H}\to \mathrm{S}}$, above which BH will gradually transit from the low/hard state to the high/soft state, and ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{crit}}$ at $30$ Schwarzschild radii as the soft-to-hard transition rate ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{tr}:\mathrm{S}\to \mathrm{H}}$, below which BH will gradually transit from the high/soft state to the low/hard state. We derive fitting formulae of ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{tr}:\mathrm{H}\to \mathrm{S}}$ and ${\dot{m}}_{\mathrm{tr}:\mathrm{S}\to \mathrm{H}}$ as functions of $\alpha$ respectively. By comparing with observations, it is found that the mean value of $\alpha$ are $\alpha \sim 0.85$ and $\alpha \sim 0.33$ for the hard-to-soft transition and the soft-to-hard transition respectively, which indicates that two classes of $\alpha$ are needed for explaining the hysteresis effect during the state transition. Finally, we argue that such a constrained $\alpha$ may provide valuable clues for further exploring the accretion physics in BH-XRBs.

10 pages, 7 figures, 4 tables, accepted for publication in MNRAS

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• A simplified approach for reproducing fully relativistic spectra in X-ray binary systems: Application to Cygnus X-1
• Accretion with two-phase gas supply and its application in black hole X-ray binaries