The Evolution of Accretion Disks with Coronae: A Model for the Low-Frequency Quasi-periodic Oscillations in X-Ray Binaries

Abstract

The global nonlinear time dependent evolution of accretion disk-corona systems in X-ray binary sources has been investigated to provide an understanding of the low frequency ($\sim 0.04$~Hz) quasi-periodic oscillations (QPOs) observed recently in the Rapid Burster MXB 1730-335 and in some black hole candidates sources (Cyg X--1 and GRO~J0422+32). We consider $\alpha$-viscosity models in which the viscous stress is proportional to the total pressure. In contrast to previous time dependent studies it is assumed that all mass accretion and angular momentum transport take place in an optically thick disk, but that a fraction of the gravitational energy that is released is dissipated in a corona. It is found that the coronal energy dissipation can effectively reduce the amplitudes of the mass flow variations generated from the thermal and viscous instabilities (in comparison to models without a corona) to a state in which the disk exhibits mild oscillatory nonsteady behavior. These oscillations are globally coherent in the unstable regions of the disk. A model for the high and low states of black hole candidate systems is also proposed. It is suggested that the low state, which is characterized by a hard X-ray spectrum, corresponds to a disk configuration in which the inner disk is in an advection dominated hot optically thin state whereas the high state corresponds to a configuration in which the inner disk is in an optically thick state surrounded by a corona. In this model, the mass accretion rate in the system is higher in the low state than in the high state. The hard X-ray spectrum of QPOs observed in the low state can be naturally explained by such a model.