Pulsars as Astrophysical Laboratories for Nuclear and Particle Physics

TL;DR

This paper discusses how pulsars serve as natural laboratories for studying nuclear and particle physics under extreme conditions, complementing laboratory experiments with astrophysical observations.

Contribution

It highlights the role of pulsars in exploring the properties of ultra-dense hadronic matter and the equation of state at high densities.

Findings

Pulsars provide unique insights into ultra-dense nuclear matter.

They complement heavy-ion collision experiments in studying extreme conditions.

Observations of pulsars inform models of nuclear physics under high density.

Abstract

A forefront area of research concerns the exploration of the properties of hadronic matter under extreme conditions of temperature and density, and the determination of the equation of state--the relation between pressure, temperature and density--of such matter. Experimentally, relativistic heavy-ion collision experiments enable physicists to cast a brief glance at hot and ultra-dense matter for times as little as about $10^{-22}$ seconds. Complementary to this, the matter that exists in the cores of neutron stars, observed as radio pulsars, X-ray pulsars, and magnetars, is at low temperatures but compressed permanently to ultra-high densities that may be more than an order of magnitude higher than the density of atomic nuclei. This makes pulsars superb astrophysical laboratories for medium and high-energy nuclear physics, as discussed in this paper.