{"paper":{"title":"Magnetospheric flows in X-ray pulsars II: Heating, cooling and ionization degree at sub-critical accretion","license":"http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/","headline":"","cross_cats":["astro-ph.SR"],"primary_cat":"astro-ph.HE","authors_text":"Alexander A. Mushtukov, Alexander Y. Potekhin, Andrew Yu, Sergey S. Tsygankov, Valery F. Suleimanov","submitted_at":"2026-07-11T15:04:08Z","abstract_excerpt":"Magnetospheric accretion flows in X-ray pulsars shape their spectra, polarization, and variability. We model the thermal balance of the flow enveloping the neutron star magnetosphere in the sub-critical regime ($L \\lesssim 10^{37}\\,\\mathrm{erg\\,s^{-1}}$), where radiation forces do not control the dynamics and single Compton scatterings dominate. The energy budget includes Compton heating by surface X-rays, compressional (adiabatic) heating in the converging flow, and radiative cooling dominated by free-free emission and contributed also by cyclotron emission. We show that the interplay of thes"},"claims":{"count":0,"items":[],"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"source":{"id":"2607.10342","kind":"arxiv","version":1},"verdict":{"id":null,"model_set":{},"created_at":null,"strongest_claim":"","one_line_summary":"","pipeline_version":null,"weakest_assumption":"","pith_extraction_headline":""},"integrity":{"clean":true,"summary":{"advisory":0,"critical":0,"by_detector":{},"informational":0},"endpoint":"/pith/2607.10342/integrity.json","findings":[],"available":true,"detectors_run":[],"snapshot_sha256":"c28c3603d3b5d939e8dc4c7e95fa8dfce3d595e45f758748cecf8e644a296938"},"references":{"count":0,"sample":[],"resolved_work":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57","internal_anchors":0},"formal_canon":{"evidence_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"author_claims":{"count":0,"strong_count":0,"snapshot_sha256":"258153158e38e3291e3d48162225fcdb2d5a3ed65a07baac614ab91432fd4f57"},"builder_version":"pith-number-builder-2026-05-17-v1"}