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Ultimate energy density of observable cold baryonic matter
James M Lattimer1, Madappa Prakash
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794-3800, USA.
Abstract:
We demonstrate that the largest measured mass of a neutron star establishes an upper bound to the energy density of observable cold baryonic matter. An equation of state-independent expression satisfied by both normal neutron stars and self-bound quark matter stars is derived for the largest energy density of matter inside stars as a function of their masses. The largest observed mass sets the lowest upper limit to the density. Implications from existing and future neutron star mass measurements are discussed.
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Their closest cousins are neutron stars, which are composed almost entirely of neutrons packed against each other, making them extremely dense. A neutron star has the same mass as the Sun but its diameter is only a few kilometers. Therefore, the escape velocity from their surface is close to the speed of light.
Not until the 1960s, when the first neutron...

