Inhomogeneous color superconductivity and the cooling of compact stars

In this talk I discuss the inhomogeneous (LOFF) color superconductive phases of Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD). In particular, I show the effect of a core of LOFF phase on the cooling of a compact star.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, uses aiproc style. Talk given at "Quark confinement and the hadron spectrum", Ponta Delgada, Acores, Portugal, 2-7 September 200

Phase diagram and pion modes of the neutral Nambu-Jona Lasinio model with the Polyakov loop

I discuss recent results obtained by our group within the Nambu-Jona Lasinio model with the Polyakov loop. I focus on the two flavor version of the model, discussing the phase diagram in the $\mu-T$ plane in the case in which electrical neutrality is required. One of the results is that pion condensation is not observed in our model when a physical mass for the light quarks is considered.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures. Invited talk at the YITP international symposium on ``Fundamental Problems in Hot and/or Dense QCD'', Kyoto, Japan, 3-6 Mar 200

Effect of neutrino trapping on the three flavor FFLO phase of QCD

We compute the effect of a non-zero lepton chemical potential on the structure of the three flavor Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov (FFLO) phase of QCD at finite temperature. We show that, as in the BCS case, the lepton chemical potential favors two-species color superconductivity and disfavors the three species pairing. We stress that this study could be relevant for the cooling of a proto-neutron star with a FFLO core, if the temperatures are higher than the un-trapping temperature.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, RevTeX4 class. Changed Fig. 2 (see text) and some reference adde

Energy density fluctuations in Early Universe

The primordial nucleosinthesys of the element can be influenced by the transitions of phase that take place after the Big Bang, such as the QCD transition. In order to study the effect of this phase transition, in this work we compute the time evolution of thermodynamical quantities of the early universe, focusing on temperature and energy density fluctuations, by solving the relevant equations of motion using as input the lattice QCD equation of state to describe the strongly interacting matter in the early universe plasma. We also study the effect of a primordial strong magnetic field by means of a phenomenological equation of state. Our results show that small inhomogeneities of strongly interacting matter in the early Universe are moderately damped during the crossover.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures. Talk given at Sventh European Summer School on Experimental Nuclear Astrophysics, 15-27 September 2013, Santa Tecla (CT) - Ital