Neutrino‐dominated Accretion and Supernovae

We suggest that part of the infalling material during the core-collapse of amassive star goes into orbit around the compact core to form a hot, dense,centrifugally-supported accretion disk whose evolution is strongly influencedby neutrino interactions. Under a wide range of conditions, thisneutrino-dominated accretion flow will be advection-dominated and will developa substantial outflowing wind. We estimate the energy carried out in the windand find that it exceeds $10^{50}$ erg for a wide range of parameters and evenexceeds 10^{51} erg for reasonable parameter choices. We propose that the windenergy will revive a stalled shock and will help produce a successful supernovaexplosion. We discuss the role of the disk wind in both prompt and delayedexplosions. While both scenarios are feasible, we suggest that a delayedexplosion is more likely, and perhaps even unavoidable. Finally, we suggestthat the disk wind may be a natural site for r-process nucleosynthesis.Comment: 53 pages, 14 figures, to appear in Ap