Excitation modes and pairing interaction in the inner crust of a neutron stars

✍ Scribed by G. Gorier; F. Ramponi; F. Barranco; R.A. Broglia; G.L. Colo`; D. Sarchi; E. Vigezzi

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2004
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 566 KB
• Volume: 731
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0375-9474
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nuclphysa.2003.11.052

✦ Synopsis

We perform a detailed calculation of the pairing properties of the inner crust of a neutron star. We focus on a specific density, and take into account the coexistence of a nuclear lattice with a superfluid gas of neutrons.

The Hartree-Fock-Bogoliubov (HFB) equations are solved adding the matrix elements of the direct nucleon-nucleon interaction and those of the interaction induced by medium-polarization effects. The latter are obtained after a detailed calculation of the excited states of the system, within the random phase approximation. It is concluded that for the density considered, polarization processes reduce the pairing gap of about a factor of 2.