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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 April 2016
Short-term aperiodic fluctuations with 1/f-like power spectral density (PSD), where f is the frequency, are characteristics of X-ray radiation from X-ray binaries. To investigate a mechanism creating fluctuations, we construct a cellular-automaton model for accretion disks based on the concept of self organized criticality (SOC). In this model, mass accretion takes place either by an avalanche triggered when the local mass density exceeds some critical value, or by a gradual diffusion occurring regardless of the critical condition. With this model, we can reproduce the observational PSD, the distributions of peak intensities of X-ray shots, and non-random temporal distribution of the shots. Possible accretion disk models producing l/f-like X-ray fluctuations are discussed. We conclude that such disks are likely to be advection dominated.