Thermodynamic instabilities in holographic neutron stars at finite temperature

TL;DR

This paper investigates the thermodynamic stability of holographic neutron stars composed of neutral fermions at finite temperature within an AdS space, revealing conditions for phase transitions and instabilities.

Contribution

It introduces a numerical analysis of finite-temperature fermionic systems in holography, extending previous zero-temperature studies to include thermal effects and stability criteria.

Findings

Thermodynamic instability occurs before the mass reaches its maximum.

Finite temperature effects influence the confinement-deconfinement transition.

The study provides a new framework for analyzing phase transitions in holographic models.

Abstract

We study the thermodynamics of a self-gravitating system of neutral fermions at finite temperature and analyze its backreaction in an asymptotically AdS space. We evaluate numerically the free entropy as a function of temperature, and perform a stability analysis applying the simple and powerful graphical method referred as the Katz criterion. We found that for highly-enough degenerate fermionic solutions, the onset of thermodynamic instability arises, though prior to the turning point on the mass as a function of the central density. Our results for finite temperature fermions provide a novel and more general way to study the confinement to deconfinement phase transition in the holographic field theory, generalizing former conclusions developed for systems at zero temperature.