Magnetic Inclination Evolution of Accreting Neutron Stars in Intermediate/Low-mass X-Ray Binaries

Abstract

The magnetic inclination angle χ , namely the angle between the spin and magnetic axes of a neutron star, plays a vital role in its observational characteristics. However, there are few systematic investigations of its long-term evolution, especially for accreting NSs in binary systems. Applying the model of Biryukov & Abolmasov and the binary evolution code MESA, we simultaneously simulate the evolution of the accretion rate, spin period, magnetic field, and magnetic inclination angle of accreting NSs in intermediate/low X-ray binaries. We show that the evolution of χ depends not only on the initial parameters of the binary systems, but also on the mass transfer history and the efficiency of pulsar loss. Based on the calculated results we present the characteristic distribution of χ for various types of systems including ultracompact X-ray binaries, binary millisecond pulsars, and ultraluminous X-ray sources, and discuss their possible observational implications.

Keywords

• Binary pulsars
• Low-mass x-ray binary stars