Long-term 3D MHD simulations of black hole accretion discs formed in neutron star mergers

We examine the long-term evolution of accretion tori around black hole (BH) remnants of compact object mergers involving at least one neutron star, to better understand their contribution to kilonovae and the synthesis of r-process elements. To this end, we modify the unsplit magnetohydrodynamic (MILD) solver in FLASH 4.5 to work in non-uniform three-dimensional spherical coordinates, enabling more efficient coverage of a large dynamic range in length scales while exploiting symmetries in the system. This modified code is used to perform BII accretion disc simulations that vary the initial magnetic field geometry and disc compactness, utilizing a physical equation of state, a neutrino leakage scheme for emission and absorption, and modelling the BII's gravity with a pseudo-Newtonian potential. Simulations run for long enough to achieve a radiatively inefficient state in the disc. We find robust mass ejection with both poloidal and toroidal initial field geometries, and suppressed outflow at high disc compactness. With the included physics, we obtain bimodal velocity distributions that trace back to mass ejection by magnetic stresses at early times, and to thermal processes in the radiatively inefficient state at late times. The electron fraction distribution of the disc outflow is broad in all models, and the ejecta geometry follows a characteristic hourglass shape. We test the effect of removing neutrino absorption or nuclear recombination with axisymmetric models, finding similar to 50 per cent less mass ejection and more neutron-rich composition without neutrino absorption, and a subdominant contribution from nuclear recombination. Tests of the MHD and neutrino leakage implementations are included.

Automated summary

In this study, we modified the solver to simulate accretion discs and found that a significant amount of mass ejection can occur during the evolution of accretion discs around black hole remnants. The velocity distribution and electron fraction distribution of the ejected mass exhibit characteristic features.