Abundance anomalies in cataclysmic variables

This nova-produced common envelope contains a large amount of nonsolar material. We demonstrate that the secondary has the capacity and time to reaccrete enough of this material to acquire a significant nonsolar convective region. This same envelope interacting with the binary will produce a frictional angular momentum loss, which can be the consequential angular momentum loss needed for the average CV white dwarf mass, the white dwarf mass accretion rates, the period minimum, the orbital period distribution, and the space density of CV problems.

This interaction will decrease the orbital period, which can cause the recently observed sudden period decreases across nova eruptions. A simple, rapid evolutionary model of the secondary that includes the swept-up nova-produced material and the increasing convective region is developed and applied to individual CVs.