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Roche lobe

noun

Etymology

Named after Édouard Roche.

Definitions

  1. The teardrop-shaped region around a star in a binary system within which orbiting…

    The teardrop-shaped region around a star in a binary system within which orbiting material is gravitationally bound to that star.

    • A further interesting situation (although not one of much relevance for this book) comes about if both stars for some reason fill their Roche lobes simultaneously.
    • Generally, mass transfer by Roche lobe overflow is required to power LMXRB's, since low mass stars never exhibit strong stellar winds.
    • If only one component accurately fills its Roche lobe the system is semi-detached. If neither fills its Roche lobe, it is detached.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for Roche lobe. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA