Kaon Zero-Point Fluctuations in Neutron Star Matter

Abstract

We investigate the contribution of zero-point motion, arising from fluctuations in kaon modes, to the ground state properties of neutron star matter containing a Bose condensate of kaons. The zero-point energy is derived via the thermodynamic partition function, by integrating out fluctuations for an arbitrary value of the condensate field. It is shown that the vacuum counterterms of the chiral Lagrangian ensure the cancellation of divergences dependent on $\mu$, the charge chemical potential, which may be regarded as an external vector potential. The total grand potential, consisting of the tree-level potential, the zero-point contribution, and the counterterm potential, is extremized to yield a locally charge neutral, beta-equilibrated and minimum energy ground state. In some regions of parameter space we encounter the well-known problem of a complex effective potential. Where the potential is real and solutions can be obtained, the contributions from fluctuations are found to be small in comparison with tree-level contributions.

40 pages RevTeX, 3 epsf figures

References in corpus (5)

• Composition and Structure of Protoneutron Stars
• Strangeness in Hadronic Stellar Matter
• Kaon Energies in Dense Matter
• Strangeness in Stellar Matter
• Hyperon-rich Matter and Kaons in Matter

Cited by in corpus (9)

• Kaons in dense matter, kaon production in heavy-ion collisions, and kaon condensation in neutron stars
• Kaon Condensation in Proto-Neutron Star Matter
• Nonequilibrium Weak Processes in Kaon Condensation II - Kinetics of condensation ---
• Protoneutron Stars with Kaon Condensation and their Delayed Collapse
• Isospin Effects on Strangeness in Heavy-Ion Collisions
• Thermal and Quantum Fluctuations in the Kaon Condensed Phase
• Kaon condensation at finite temperature
• Nonequilibrium Weak Processes in Kaon Condensation I --- Reaction rate for the thermal kaon process ---
• Neutrino Opacities in Neutron Stars with Kaon Condensates