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The Transient Radio Sky pp 15–39Cite as

Neutron Stars

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Part of the book series: Springer Theses ((Springer Theses))

Abstract

It is now understood that sufficiently massive stars will end their lives violently with explosions which can outshine their host galaxy. The core, of the star that was, collapses into a super-dense ball with exotic properties. These objects are known as neutron stars, the most exciting physical laboratories that nature has provided us with. Here we describe the various avenues of stellar evolution before focusing on the neutron star end-point. We describe the structure of the re-born zombie stellar remnant and its manifestation as a radio source. The physics is extreme, the environments are deadly, zombies are cool.

Oh my God ... it has finally happened, he has become so massive that he collapsed into himself like a neutron star

Stewie Griffin

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Notes

  1. 1.

    A star with \(M>0.5\hbox{M}_{\bigodot}\) will move at essentially constant luminosity along a horizontal line on the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram after it has travelled down its Hayashi track.

  2. 2.

    More generally, for a rotating body, the Virial Theorem is \({\frac{1}{2}}{\frac{d^2I}{dt^2}}=2U+\Upomega+2T+M_{{\rm B}}\,+\) (surface terms), where \(I\) is the moment of inertia, \(T\) is kinetic energy in bulk motion and \(M_{{\rm B}}\) is any magnetic energy.

  3. 3.

    Later nuclear reaction thresholds depend even more strongly on temperature: for the CNO cycle \(\epsilon_{\rm{CNO}}\propto\rho T^{16};\) for the triple-\(\alpha\) process \(\epsilon_{3\alpha}\propto\rho^2T^{40}.\)

  4. 4.

    This can result in unresolved stars being mistaken for one, more massive, star so that the derived probability at higher masses will be artificially increased.

  5. 5.

    Recall the empirical relation for MS stars which states that \(L\propto M^{\sim3.5}\) [54].

  6. 6.

    A body-centred cubic lattice has a coefficient of 1.44423.

  7. 7.

    Other pasta-based vocabulary is also used and this magnetic spaghettification should not be confused with gravitational spaghettification!

  8. 8.

    This quark matter would consist of up, down and strange quarks. The other three flavours are too massive to be created within NSs.

  9. 9.

    See Lynden-Bell [39] for calculations involving relativistic rotation speeds.

  10. 10.

    \({P_0(x)=1, P_1(x)=x, P_2(x)={\frac{1}{2}}(3x^2-1)}.\)

  11. 11.

    Although I prefer the name eRRATic neutron stars.

  12. 12.

    Not \(30^\circ,\) as published in McLaughlin et al. [45].

  13. 13.

    The difference between B0656\(+\)14, and, although not mentioned, the ‘giant-micropulses’ seen in Vela, are quite arbitrary. There is little evidence that there is any physical difference in these situations. We will, at times, refer to all of these phenomena collectively as “giant pulses”.

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  1. School of Physics and Astronomy, Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Alan Turing Building, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK

    Evan Francis Keane

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Keane, E.F. (2011). Neutron Stars. In: The Transient Radio Sky. Springer Theses. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-19627-0_2

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