pynucastro: A Python Library for Nuclear Astrophysics

Abstract

We describe pynucastro 2.0, an open source library for interactively creating and exploring astrophysical nuclear reaction networks. We demonstrate new methods for approximating rates and using detailed balance to create reverse rates, show how to build networks and determine whether they are appropriate for a particular science application, and discuss the changes made to the library over the past few years. Finally, we demonstrate the validity of the networks produced and share how we use pynucastro networks in simulation codes.

Submitted to Astrophysical Journal notebooks to reproduce all figures are available via Zenodo DOI: https://zenodo.org/record/7202413