Thermal Evolution of Isolated Neutron Stars
arXiv:astro-ph/9706259
Abstract
I give a general overview of the theory of neutron star cooling, emphasizing the intuitive understanding of the effects of the various physical ingredients, including the recently proposed accreted envelopes and neutrino emission from Cooper pair breaking and formation. I describe how the present data may be compatible with both the `standard model' and the fast cooling scenarios, with or without invoking extensive presence of baryon pairing.
12+1 pages, LaTeX (with crckapb macro) To be published in the proceedings of the NATO ASI `The Many Faces of Neutron Stars' (Kluwer), Eds A. Alpar, R. Buccheri & J. van Paradijs. Extensive data files are available at http://www.astroscu.unam.mx/neutrones/NS-Cooler/NS-Cooler.html