Long-term photometric behaviour of outbursting AM CVn systems

Abstract

The AM CVn systems are a class of He-rich, post-period minimum, semidetached, ultracompact binaries. Their long-term light curves have been poorly understood due to the few systems known and the long (hundreds of days) recurrence times between outbursts. We present combined photometric light curves from the Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research, Catalina Real-Time Transient Survey, and Palomar Transient Factory synoptic surveys to study the photometric variability of these systems over an almost 10 yr period. These light curves provide a much clearer picture of the outburst phenomena that these systems undergo. We characterize the photometric behaviour of most known outbursting AM CVn systems and establish a relation between their outburst properties and the systems' orbital periods. We also explore why some systems have only shown a single outburst so far and expand the previously accepted phenomenological states of AM CVn systems. We conclude that the outbursts of these systems show evolution with respect to the orbital period, which can likely be attributed to the decreasing mass transfer rate with increasing period. Finally, we consider the number of AM CVn systems that should be present in modelled synoptic surveys.

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