Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
Apr 2002
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002aps..aprn17027c&link_type=abstract
American Physical Society, April Meeting, Jointly Sponsored with the High Energy Astrophysics Division (HEAD) of the American As
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
Scientific paper
Observations of thermal emission from the surfaces of radio pulsars with ages less than 10^4-5 years currently indicate that the main photospheric constituents are hydrogen or helium. Pulsars which are older than ~ 10^5 years seem to have photospheres of heavier, more uniformly opaque, elements. This points to a possible evolution on a time scale of ~ 10^5 years. On the photosphere of a cooling neutron star, the low temperatures (≈ 10^6K) and low densities (≈ 1 g cm-3) preclude the possibility of nuclear burning. However, more extreme conditions (T ≈ 10^7-8K) exist a mere ~ 10 meters beneath the photosphere, and once hydrogen or helium has diffused to those depths, its lifetime is very short. We calculate the rate of this diffusive nuclear burning for a range of cooling neutron star models and speculate on the consequences of this mechanism for various neutron stars. This is likely to constrain the composition of the outer layers of the neutron star envelope from observations of thermal emission.
Bildsten Lars
Chang Philip
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