Life isn’t exactly like a box of chocolates. But it seems there is. Neutron stars – some of the densest objects in the Universe – can have structures very similar to chocolates, with either gooey or hard centers.
It is not yet clear what types of particle configurations these centers contain, but new theoretical work could lead to a better understanding of the strange inner workings of these stars, as well as the wild extremes that are possible in the Universe.
The neutron stars are quite amazing. We should also consider Black holesThe Universe’s Most Dense Award second prize goes to neutron star, which is a stellar with a high concentration of matter. Once a star has a mass that is between 8 and 30 times the Sun’s, its core runs out of matter to fuse, so heat’s outward pressure stops it from supporting the core. This causes the core to crumble under gravity. Surrounding Gases drift into space.
The result? neutron starIt has a mass that is 2.3 times smaller than the Sun’s, but it can be squeezed into a 20 km (12 mile) sphere. These things are capital-letters DENSE – and what exactly happens to matter under such mind-blowing pressures is something scientists are dying to know.
Some studies suggest that nuclei can crowd together to form new structures. Pasta-like shapes. Others speculate that pressures get so intense inside the star that atomic nuclei cease exist. Condensing into a soup of quark matter.
Luciano Rezzolla from Goethe University, Germany, is now leading a team of theoretical physicists who have found that neutron stars may be similar to chocolates filled with different ingredients.
A team of scientists combined theoretical nuclear physics with astrophysical observations in order to produce a number of more than one million “equations state”. These are equations that determine the volume, temperature, pressure and volume of any given system, such as a neutron star.
The team used these to create a scale-dependent description about the speed sound in neutron star. Here’s where things get interesting. The structure of an object’s interior can be revealed by the speed at which it is vibrated, be it a planet or a star.
Just like seismic waves EarthAnd MarsDifferent materials can be used to propagate the plants, showing different structures and layers. Acoustic wavesStars that move in space can reveal the truth about their inner workings.
Their equations of state were used to examine the speed of sound in neutron star stars. However, the structures of the teams did not match up. Instead, neutron stars below 1.7 times the Sun’s mass seemed to have a harder core and a soft mantle, while those above that amount had both a hard and flexible core.
“This result gives us a direct measurement of how compressible the centre of neutron stars can become,” Rezzolla says.
“Neutron stars appear to behave somewhat like chocolate pralines. Light stars look like chocolates with a hazelnut at their centers, while heavy stars are more like chocolates with a hard layer and a soft filling.
This is consistent with the nuclear pasta and quarksoup interpretations of neutronstar innards. It also offers new information that could allow for future modeling of neutron stars across different masses.
This could explain why, regardless of their masses and their diameters, all neutron star have approximately the same 20-kilometers in circumference.
“Our numerical studies allow us to not only predict the radii of neutron stars and their maximum masses, but also to establish new limits on deformability in binary systems. This is how strong they distort one another through their gravitational fields.” Christian Ecker, physicist, saysof the University of Goethe.
These insights will be particularly valuable to identify the unknown equation for state with future observations and detections by astronomy. Gravitational wavesFrom merging stars
Who doesn’t love chocolate praline nuclear pasta quark soup?
The research was published in two papers. The Astrophysical Journal Letters. You can find them HereAnd Here.
