Tidal Stripping of a White Dwarf by an Intermediate-Mass Black Hole

Understand

During the inspiralling of a white dwarf (WD) into an intermediate-mass black hole (~ 10^{2-5} M_sun), both gravitational waves (GWs) and electromagnetic (EM) radiation are emitted.

• Once the eccentric orbit's pericenter radius approaches the tidal radius, the WD would be tidally stripped upon each pericenter passage.
• The accretion of these stripped mass would produce EM radiation.
• It is suspected that the recently discovered new types of transients, namely the quasi-periodic eruptions and the fast ultraluminous X-ray bursts, might originate from such systems.