Hauke's second thesis paper and postdoctoral position
I am proud and pleased to report
Since the 1970s the standard approach for analysing the X-ray spectrum emitted
during thermonuclear bursts included subtracting off the persistent spectrum
prior to the burst, implicitly assuming that this component (which arises
from accretion) could not vary during the burst. On the other hand,
predictions
of the response of the accretion disk to the
sudden X-ray brightening during a burst suggest that the accretion rate
should increase.
In a study of several hundred bright bursts observed by the
Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer</a>, Monash PhD student
Hauke Worpel
found evidence that the accretion rate does increase during the burst, and
by a substantial amount, up to a factor of 20. This result was also
corroborated by the recent
simultaneous observation of a burst by Chandra and
RXTE.
Hauke's paper was just accepted by ApJ.
Read the paper arXiv:1303.4824