The nuclear symmetry energy, the inner crust, and global neutron star modeling
arXiv:1112.2018
Abstract
The structure and composition of the inner crust of neutron stars, as well as global stellar properties such as radius and moment of inertia, have been shown to correlate with parameters characterizing the symmetry energy of nuclear matter such as its magnitude J and density dependence L at saturation density. It is thus mutually beneficial to nuclear physicists and astrophysicists to examine the combined effects of such correlations on potential neutron star observables in the light of recent experimental and theoretical constraints on J, L, and relationships between them. We review some basic correlations between these nuclear and astrophysical observables, and illustrate the impact of recent progress in constraining the J-L parameter space on the composition of the inner crust, crust-core transition density and pressure, and extent of the hypothesized pasta region. We use a simple compressible liquid drop model in conjunction with a simple model of nuclear matter which allows for independent, smooth, variation of the J and L. We extend the model into the core using the same nuclear matter model to explore the effects on global crust and core properties, and on potential observables such as crust oscillation frequencies and mechanically supported crust deformation. Throughout we illustrate the importance of the relationship between J and L implicit in a particular model of nuclear matter to the predictions of neutron star properties.
25 pages, 11 figures; to appear as a chapter in the book "Neutron Star Crust", edited by C. A. Bertulani and J. Piekarewicz
References in corpus (3)
- A survey of the parameter space of the compressible liquid drop model as applied to the neutron star inner crust
- Upper limits on the observational effects of nuclear pasta in neutron stars
- Sensitivity of the neutron star r-mode instability window to the density dependence of the nuclear symmetry energy