X-rays and Fluctuating X-Winds from Protostars

Abstract

Protostars emit more x-rays, hard and soft, than young sunlike stars in more advanced stages of formation. The x-ray emission becomes harder and stronger during flares. The excess x-rays may arise as a result of the time-dependent interaction of an accretion disk with the magnetosphere of the central star. Flares produced by such fluctuations have important implications for the x-wind model of protostellar jets, for the flash-heating of the chondrules found in chondritic meteorites, and for the production of short-lived radioactivities through the bombardment of primitive rocks by solar cosmic rays.