prof. dr hab. Armen Sedrakian, IFT UWr

Exploring phases of dense matter with astrophysics of compact stars

In this talk, I will focus on the behavior of matter at high densities in compact stars and the challenges that emerged in recent years in the nuclear physics and astrophysics of these objects. The possibility that new particles appear in the dense matter will be discussed. In particular, I will discuss the phase transition from baryonic to deconfined quark matter and its consequences for compact star astrophysics. I will show that a strong first-order phase transition among the phases of dense quark matter can lead to triplet configurations of compact stars, i.e., three stars with the same masses but different radii. Finally, I will discuss the implications of the recent detection of gravitational waves from a collision of two neutron stars.