25 South Green Drive, Athens, Ohio 45701

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The Physics & Astronomy Colloquium Series presents Jaki Noronha-Hostler of University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, discussing "Using Neutron Stars and Lab Experiments to Test a Speed of Sound that Approaches the Speed of Light" on January 17.

 

Abstract: From the observation of both heavy neutron stars and light ones with small radii, one anticipates a steep rise in the speed of sound of nuclear matter as a function of baryon density up to values close to the causal limit. A question follows whether such behavior of the speed of sound in neutron-rich matter is compatible with the equation of state extracted from low-energy heavy-ion collisions.

In this work, we considered a family of neutron star equations of state characterized by a steep rise in the speed of sound, and use the symmetry energy expansion to obtain equations of state applicable to the almost-symmetric nuclear matter created in heavy-ion collisions. We then compared collective flow data from low-energy heavy-ion experiments with results of simulations obtained using the hadronic transport code SMASH with the mean-field potential reproducing the density-dependence of the speed of sound. We show that equations of state featuring a peak in the speed of sound squared occurring at densities between 2–3 times the saturation density of normal nuclear matter, producing neutron stars of nearly Mmax ≈ 2.5M⊙, are consistent with heavy-ion collision data.

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