Finite Temperature Considerations in the Structure of Quadratic GUP-modified White Dwarfs

TL;DR

This paper investigates how finite temperature effects and quadratic GUP modifications influence the structure and mass-radius relations of white dwarfs, extending previous zero-temperature models to more realistic scenarios.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive analysis of finite temperature effects combined with quadratic GUP modifications on white dwarf equations of state and their mass-radius relations.

Findings

Finite temperature softens the EoS at low pressures.

Quadratic GUP stiffens the EoS at high pressures.

Mass-radius relations are significantly altered at high GUP parameters and temperatures.

Abstract

In quantum gravity phenomenology, the effect of the generalized uncertainty principle (GUP) on white dwarfs has been given much attention in the literature. However, these studies assume a zero temperature equation of state (EoS), consequently excluding young white dwarfs whose initial temperatures are substantially high. To that cause, this paper calculates the Chandrasekhar EoS and resulting mass-radius relations of finite temperature white dwarfs modified by the quadratic GUP, an approach that extends Heisenberg's uncertainty principle by a quadratic term in momenta. The EoS was first approximated by treating the quadratic GUP parameter as perturbative, causing the EoS to exhibit expected thermal deviations at low pressures, and conflicting behaviors at high pressures, depending on the order of approximation. We then proceeded with a full numerical simulation of the modified EoS, and showed that in general, finite temperatures cause the EoS at low pressures to soften, while the quadratic GUP stiffens the EoS at high pressures. This modified EoS was then applied to the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkoff equations and its classical approximation to obtain the modified mass-radius relations for general relativistic and Newtonian white dwarfs. The relations for both cases were found to exhibit the expected thermal deviations at small masses, where low-mass white dwarfs are shifted to the high-mass regime at large radii, while high-mass white dwarfs acquire larger masses, beyond the Chandrasekhar limit. Additionally, we find that for sufficiently large values of the GUP parameter and temperature, we obtain mass-radius relations that are completely removed from the ideal case, as high-mass deviations due to GUP and low-mass deviations due to temperature are no longer mutually exclusive.