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Merging neutron stars produce "kilonovae"—electromagnetic transients powered by the decay of unstable nuclei synthesized via rapid neutron capture (the r-process) in material that is gravitationally unbound during inspiral and coalescence. Kilonova emission, if accurately interpreted, can be used to characterize the masses and compositions of merger-driven outflows, helping to resolve a long-standing debate about the origins of r-process material in the Universe. We explore how the uncertain properties of nuclei involved in the r-process complicate the inference of outflow properties from kilonova observations. Using r-process simulations, we show how nuclear physics uncertainties impact predictions of radioactive heating and element synthesis. For a set of models that span a large range in both predicted heating and final abundances, we carry out detailed numerical calculations of decay product thermalization and radiation transport in a kilonova ejecta with a fixed mass and density profile. The light curves associated with our models exhibit great diversity in their luminosities, with peak brightness varying by more than an order of magnitude. We also find variability in the shape of the kilonova light curves and their color, which in some cases runs counter to the expectation that increasing levels of lanthanide and/or actinide enrichment will be correlated with longer, dimmer, redder emission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mergers of binary neutron stars, as well as black hole–neutron star systems, are expected to produce an electromagnetic counterpart that can be analyzed to infer the element synthesis that occurred in these events. We investigate one source of uncertainties pertinent to lanthanide-rich outflows: the nuclear inputs to rapid neutron capture nucleosynthesis calculations. We begin by examining 32 different combinations of nuclear inputs: eight mass models, two types of spontaneous fission rates, and two types of fission daughter product distributions. We find that such nuclear physics uncertainties typically generate at least one order of magnitude uncertainty in key quantities such as the nuclear heating (one and a half orders of magnitude at 1 day post-merger), the bolometric luminosity (one order of magnitude at 5 days post-merger), and the inferred mass of material from the bolometric luminosity (factor of 8 when considering the 8–10 day region). Since particular nuclear processes are critical for determining the electromagnetic signal, we provide tables of key nuclei undergoing β-decay, α-decay, and spontaneous fission important for heating at different times, identifying decays that are common among the many nuclear input combinations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The likely outcome of a compact object merger event is a central black hole surrounded by a rapidly accreting torus of debris. This disc of debris is a rich source of element synthesis, the outcome of which is needed to predict electromagnetic counterparts of individual events and to understand the contribution of mergers to galactic chemical evolution. Here we study disc outflow nucleosynthesis in the context of a two-dimensional, time-dependent black hole-neutron star merger accretion disc model. We use two time snapshots from this model to examine the impact of the evolution of the neutrino fluxes from the disc on the element synthesis. While the neutrino fluxes from the early-time disc snapshot appear to favor neutron-rich outflows, by the late-time snapshot the situation is reversed. As a result we find copious production of 56Ni in the outflows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Black hole (BH) accretion disks have been proposed as good candidates for a range of interesting nucleosynthesis, including the r-process. The presence of the BH influences the neutrino fluxes and affects the nucleosynthesis resulting from the interaction of the emitted neutrinos and hot outflowing material ejected from the disk. We study the impact of general relativistic effects on the neutrinos emitted from BH accretion disks. We present abundances obtained by considering null geodesics and energy shifts for two different disk models. We find that both the bending of the neutrino trajectories and the energy shifts have important consequences for the nucleosynthetic outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the prospects for producing nickel-56 from black hole accretion disks, by examining a range of steady state disk models. We focus on relatively slowly accreting disks in the range of Ṁ = 0.05 M⊙ s-1 to Ṁ = 1 M⊙, s-1, as are thought to be appropriate for the central engines of long-duration gamma-ray bursts. We find that significant amounts of nickel-56 are produced over a wide range of parameter space. We discuss the influence of entropy, outflow timescale, and initial disk position on mass fraction of nickel-56 which is produced. We keep careful track of the weak interactions to ensure reliable calculations of the electron fraction, and discuss the role of the neutrinos. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]