“Another open question answered – Research group finds substantial confirmation for the presence of quark matter inside cores of most massive and stable neutron stars discovered till date”
Neutron star – a brief introduction.
Walter Baade and Fritz Zwicky at the meeting of American Physical Society (1933) for the first time put forth the notion of the existence of neutron stars. Neutron stars are believed to be remnants of huge supernova explosions; they consist of neutrons that are densely packed. The detection of these neutron stars was thought to be almost impossible as it would be too faint to detect but later it was proposed that if the neutron stars were spinning and if they had a large magnetic field then electromagnetic waves would be emitted out. Shortly afterward radio pulses were detected from stars. Scientists are now convinced that these stars are rapidly spinning highly magnetized neutron stars. Such stars are now more commonly known as pulsars.
The neutron star studies have produced pieces of evidence of strange phenomena happening in this universe and these studies show how mankind from this pale blue dot is trying to unravel the mysteries of the universe. For example, in 2011, a research paper was published which explains the first direct evidence of neutron stars producing a superfluid of neutrons, a state of matter that cannot be created in laboratories
What is inside these neutron stars?
This has always remained an open question which now the researchers from the University of Helsinki are claiming to have answered in their recent paper published in the prestigious Nature Physics journal. According to Associate Professor Aleksi Vuorinen from the University of Helsinki’s Department of Physics, it has always been an important goal for neutron star studies to confirm the existence of quark cores.
The research group took a modern path to try and solve the problem. They combined astrophysical measurements and the recent findings of theoretical particle and nuclear physics and were able to infer the identity and characteristics of matter inside the neutron stars.
The study shows that the matter inside most stable and massive neutron stars are a good comparison to quark matter than to ordinary nuclear matter. As the calculations indicate, the diameter of the quark matter might exceed half of that of the entire neutron star.
This new leap in the understanding came about due to two recent results that emerged from the field of observational astrophysics: the gravitational wave measurements from neutron star merger and the detection of massive neutron stars with masses approximately close to two solar masses.
Expecting a Bright Future.
With LIGO detecting more neutron star mergers and the accumulation of new observational data that helps improve the accuracy of research findings as is in this case for the Finnish research group we can expect further observations and breaking discoveries in this field of study.
The research group includes in addition to Vuorinen, doctoral student Eemeli Annala from Helsinki, as well as their colleagues Tyler Gorda from the University of Virginia, Aleksi Kurkela from CERN, and Joonas Nättilä from Columbia University.
Source: Nature
– Atul James
Author
The accurate details provided makes the blog interesting to read as well as informational. Loved reading it! Looking forward to more awesome blogs.
Thank you. Your encouraging words motivate us to write more 🙂