Constraining the High-Density Behavior of Nuclear Symmetry Energy with the Tidal Polarizability of Neutron Stars

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the tidal polarizability of neutron stars can serve as a sensitive indicator of the high-density behavior of nuclear symmetry energy, which is crucial yet uncertain in dense neutron-rich matter.

Contribution

It demonstrates that tidal polarizability is highly sensitive to high-density symmetry energy and remains relatively stable against variations in symmetric nuclear matter properties.

Findings

Tidal polarizability strongly constrains high-density symmetry energy.

It varies less than ±10% with changes in symmetric nuclear matter properties.

Provides insights into dense neutron-rich matter properties.

Abstract

Using a set of model equations of state satisfying the latest constraints from both terrestrial nuclear experiments and astrophysical observations as well as state-of-the-art nuclear many-body calculations of the pure neutron matter equation of state, the tidal polarizability of canonical neutron stars in coalescing binaries is found to be a very sensitive probe of the high-density behavior of nuclear symmetry energy which is among the most uncertain properties of dense neutron-rich nucleonic matter. Moreover, it changes less than $\pm 10%$ by varying various properties of symmetric nuclear matter and symmetry energy around the saturation density within their respective ranges of remaining uncertainty.