Hot Nuclear Matter : A Variational Approach

We develop a nonperturbative technique in field theory to study properties of infinite nuclear matter at zero temperature as well as at finite temperatures. Here we dress the nuclear matter with off-mass shell pions. The techniques of thermofield dynamics are used for finite temperature calculations. Equation of state is derived from the dynamics of the interacting system in a self consistent manner. The transition temperature for nuclear matter appears to be around 15 MeV.Comment: 16 pages, IP/BBSR/91-3

Short range correlations in relativistic nuclear matter models

Short range correlations are introduced using unitary correlation method in a relativistic approach to the equation of state of the infinite nuclear matter in the framework of the Hartree-Fock approximation. It is shown that the correlations give rise to an extra node in the ground-state wave-function in the nucleons, contrary to what happens in non-relativistic calculations with a hard core. The effect of the correlations in the ground state properties of the nuclear matter and neutron matter is studied. The nucleon effective mass and equation of state (EOS) are very sensitive to short range correlations. In particular, if the pion contact term is neglected a softening of the EOS is predicted. Correlations have also an important effect on the neutron matter EOS which presents no binding but only a very shallow minimum contrary to the Walecka model.Comment: 8pages, 4 figure

Neutron matter - Quark matter phase transition and Quark star

We consider the neutron matter quark matter phase transition along with possible existence of hybrid quark stars. The equation of state for neutron matter is obtained using a nonperturbative method with pion dressing of the neutron matter and an analysis similar to that of symmetric nuclear matter. The quark matter sector is treated perturbatively in the small distance domain. For bag constant $B^{1/4}$=148 MeV, a first order phase transition is seen. In the context of neutron quark hybrid stars, Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkoff equations are solved using the equations of state for quark matter and for neutron matter with a phase transition as noted earlier. Stable solutions for such stars are obtained with the Chandrasekhar limit as 1.58 $M_\odot$ and radius around 10 km. The bulk of the star is quark matter with a thin crust of neutron matter of less than a kilometer.Comment: 28 pages including 9 figures, Revtex, IP/BBSR/92-8

NiS - An unusual self-doped, nearly compensated antiferromagnetic metal

NiS, exhibiting a text-book example of a first-order transition with many unusual properties at low temperatures, has been variously described in terms of conflicting descriptions of its ground state during the past several decades. We calculate these physical properties within first-principle approaches based on the density functional theory and conclusively establish that all experimental data can be understood in terms of a rather unusual ground state of NiS that is best described as a self-doped, nearly compensated, antiferromagnetic metal, resolving the age-old controversy. We trace the origin of this novel ground state to the specific details of the crystal structure, band dispersions and a sizable Coulomb interaction strength that is still sub-critical to drive the system in to an insulating state. We also show how the specific antiferromagnetic structure is a consequence of the less-discussed 90 degree and less than 90 degree superexchange interactions built in to such crystal structures