Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2022/iii/paper-321/1/b/solution

The first equation is vertical hydrostatic equilibrium: the pressure gradient balances the vertical gravity of the central mass, , and the disk's own potential . The second is the plane-parallel Poisson equation for disk self-gravity. The third balances the vertical increase of radiative flux against local viscous heating in a Keplerian alpha disk, and the fourth is the optically thick radiative diffusion law.
With , , and all terms in hydrostatic balance comparable,
The first comparison gives ; inserting it into the second gives . Hence
up to the order-one constants deliberately omitted by the scaling argument.

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