Electron transport through nuclear pasta in magnetized neutron stars

We present a simple model for electron transport in a possible layer of exotic nuclear clusters (in the so called nuclear pasta layer) between the crust and liquid core of a strongly magnetized neutron star. The electron transport there can be strongly anisotropic and gyrotropic. The anisotropy is produced by different electron effective collision frequencies along and across local symmetry axis in domains of exotic ordered nuclear clusters and by complicated effects of the magnetic field. We also calculate averaged kinetic coefficients in case local domains are freely oriented. Possible applications of the obtained results and open problems are outlined.Comment: 11 pages 5 figures, MNRAS, accepte

Shear viscosity in magnetized neutron star crust

The electron shear viscosity due to Coulomb scattering of degenerate electrons by atomic nuclei throughout a magnetized neutron star crust is calculated. The theory is based on the shear viscosity coefficient calculated neglecting magnetic fields but taking into account gaseous, liquid and solid states of atomic nuclei, multiphonon scattering processes, and finite sizes of the nuclei albeit neglecting the effects of electron band structure. The effects of strong magnetic fields are included in the relaxation time approximation with the effective electron relaxation time taken from the field-free theory. The viscosity in a magnetized matter is described by five shear viscosity coefficients. They are calculated and their dependence on the magnetic field and other parameters of dense matter is analyzed. Possible applications and open problems are outlined.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, EPL, accepte

Statistical theory of thermal evolution of neutron stars - II. Limitations on direct Urca threshold

We apply our recently suggested statistical approach to thermal evolution of isolated neutron stars and accreting quasistationary neutron stars in X-ray transients for constraining the position and relative broadening alpha of the direct Urca threshold of powerful neutrino emission in neutron star cores. We show that most likely explanation of observations corresponds to alpha = 0.08 - 0.10 and to the neutron star mass, at which the direct Urca process is open, M_D = (1.6 - 1.8) M_sun.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figure

Diffusion and Coulomb separation of ions in dense matter

We analyze diffusion equations in strongly coupled Coulomb mixtures of ions in dense stellar matter. Strong coupling of ions in the presence of gravitational forces and electric fields (induced by plasma polarization in the presence of gravity) produces a specific diffusion current which can separate ions with the same A/Z (mass to charge number) ratios but different Z. This Coulomb separation of ions can be important for the evolution of white dwarfs and neutron stars.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures; slightly updated with respect to version

Statistical theory of thermal evolution of neutron stars

Thermal evolution of neutron stars is known to depend on the properties of superdense matter in neutron star cores. We suggest a statistical analysis of isolated cooling middle-aged neutron stars and old transiently accreting quasi-stationary neutron stars warmed up by deep crustal heating in low-mass X-ray binaries. The method is based on simulations of the evolution of stars of different masses and on averaging the results over respective mass distributions. This gives theoretical distributions of isolated neutron stars in the surface temperature--age plane and of accreting stars in the photon thermal luminosity--mean mass accretion rate plane to be compared with observations. This approach permits to explore not only superdense matter but also the mass distributions of isolated and accreting neutron stars. We show that the observations of these stars can be reasonably well explained by assuming the presence of the powerful direct Urca process of neutrino emission in the inner cores of massive stars, introducing a slight broadening of the direct Urca threshold (for instance, by proton superfluidity), and by tuning mass distributions of isolated and accreted neutron stars.Comment: 13 pages, 20 figure