Recombination energy in double white dwarf formation

Understand

In this Letter we investigate the role of recombination energy during a common envelope event.

• We confirm that taking this energy into account helps to avoid the formation of the circumbinary envelope commonly found in previous studies.
• For the first time, we can model a complete common envelope event, with a clean compact double white dwarf binary system formed at the end.
• The resulting binary orbit is almost perfectly circular.