Context. Helium accretion induced explosions in CO white dwarfs (WDs) are considered promising candidates for a number of observed types of stellar transients, including supernovae (SNe) of Type Ia and Type Iax. However, a clear favorite outcome has not yet emerged.
Aims. We explore the conditions of helium ignition in the WD and the final fates of helium star-WD binaries as functions of their initial orbital periods and component masses.
Methods. We computed 274 model binary systems with the Binary Evolution Code, in which both components are fully resolved. Both stellar and orbital evolution were computed including mass and angular momentum transfer, tides, gravitational wave emission, differential rotation, and internal hydrodynamic and magnetic angular momentum transport. We worked out the parts of the parameter space leading to detonations of the accreted helium layer on the WD, likely resulting in the complete disruption of the WD to deflagrations, where the CO core of the WD may remain intact and where helium ignition in the WD is avoided.
Results. We find that helium detonations are expected only in systems with the shortest initial orbital periods, and for initially massive WDs (MWD ≥ 1.0 M⊙) and lower mass donors (Mdonor ≤ 0.8 M⊙), which have accumulated helium layers mostly exceeding 0.1 M⊙. Upon detonation, these systems would release the donor as a hypervelocity pre-WD runaway star, for which we predict the expected range of kinematic and stellar properties. Systems with more massive donors or initial periods exceeding 1.5 h likely undergo helium deflagrations after accumulating 0.1 − 0.001 M⊙ of helium. Helium ignition in the WD is avoided in systems with helium donor stars below ∼0.6 M⊙, and leads to three distinctly different groups of double WD systems.
Conclusions. The size of the parameter space open to helium detonation corresponds to only about 3% of the galactic SN Ia rate and to 10% of the SN Iax rate, while the predicted large amounts of helium (0.1 M⊙) in progenitors cannot easily be reconciled with observations of archetypical SN Ia. However, the transients emerging from these systems may contribute significantly to massive helium novae, calcium-rich SNe Ib, and, potentially, very close double degenerate systems that may eventually produce either ordinary or peculiar SNe Ia, or, for the smallest considered masses, R Coronae Borealis stars.
Fun for Two
