The abundances of light and medium size clusters in low density nuclear matter

Abstract

The formation of nuclear clusters at low nuclear density has been investigated experimentally and theoretically over the last few years. It also has great interest in astrophysics and cosmology. At low density, nuclear matter can minimize its entropy and energy by forming clusters. Previous studies included the formation of clusters up to A=4, whereas our study includes the formation of clusters up to A=25. We study the effect of including these clusters on the critical temperature and the equation of state of low energy nuclear matter. The formation of the clusters is studied within the modified Nuclear Statistical Equilibrium Model (NSE) which assumes that the clusters are in chemical equilibrium with the nucleons in the surrounding vapor. The NSE is modified by including the decrease in the cluster’s binding energy with increasing density of the surrounding medium of free nucleons. We find that these clusters affect the composition of nuclear matter significantly at different ranges of densities. Also including these clusters decrease critical temperature by several MeV’s.