The effective temperature distribution function of cataclysmic variable white dwarfs

Abstract

With the recent detection of direct white dwarf photospheric radiation from certain cataclysmic variables in quiescent (low accretion) states, important implications and clues about the nature and long-term evolution of cataclysmic variables can emerge from an analysis of their physical properties. Detection of the underlying white dwarfs has led to a preliminary empirical CV white dwarf temperature distribution function and, in a few cases, the first detailed look at a freshly accreted white dwarf photosphere. The effective temperatures of CV white dwarfs plotted versus orbital period for each type of CV appears to reveal a tendency for the cooler white dwarf primaries to resisde in the shorter period systems. Possible implications are briefly discussed.