The physics and observational consequences of the neutron star crust-core boundary layer.
William Newton, Texas A&M University - Commerce
A neutron star, of order 10km in radius, is believed to have a mostly solid outer layer, the crust, about 1km thick, and a fluid core comprising the remaining depth to the center. The theoretical study of the properties of matter at the boundary layer between crust and core is crucial to understanding certain observational phenomena such as pulsar glitches, quasi-periodic oscillations in the X-ray tails of SGR light curves, and potential gravitational waves from neutron star oscillation modes and deviations from axial symmetry from material accreted onto the surface. I will introduce the various ingredients to such studies: nuclei and exotic nuclear clusters immersed in a neutron fluid at the bottom of the crust and the composition, mechanical, tranport and superfluid porperties of such matter, and their dependence on the equation of state of nuclear matter. I will discuss what the possible observational signatures of the boundary layer are.