I review recent advances in our understanding of accretion disks in transient systems - the dwarf novae and the soft X-ray transients. The primary theme will be the ongoing development of theory in response to the observations. The accretion disk limit cycle model appears to provide a unifying framework within which we may begin to understand what is seen in different types of interacting binary stars, and also to constrain parameters which enter into the theory.
Categories: astro-ph