Gravitational phase transition of self-gravitating systems of fermions in General Relativity

Abstract

The Thomas-Fermi model is extended at finite temperature, to describe the gravitational phase transition occurring in massive fermionic systems in a general-relativistic framework. It is shown that, when a nondegenerate fermionic gas (for $N<N_{OV}$, where $N_{OV}$ is the Oppenheimer-Volkoff limit) is cooled down below a critical temperature, a condensed phase emerges and the gravitational collapse is prevented by quantum mechanics. If $N>N_{OV}$, by contrast, the system is destined to collapse towards a Black Hole because no equilibrium states exist.

arXiv comment6 pages, 4 figures. To be published in the proceedings of the 15th Marcel Grossmann Meeting