Fusion reactions in multicomponent dense matter
- Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute, Poliekhnicheskaya 26, RU-194021 Saint Petersburg, Russia and Department of Physics and Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556 (United States)
We analyze thermonuclear and pycnonuclear fusion reactions in dense matter containing atomic nuclei of different types. We extend a phenomenological expression for the reaction rate, proposed recently by Gasques et al. [Phys. Rev. C 72, 025806 (2005)] for the one-component plasma of nuclei, to the multicomponent plasma. The expression contains several fit parameters which we adjust to reproduce the best microscopic calculations available in the literature. Furthermore, we show that pycnonuclear burning is drastically affected by an (unknown) structure of the multicomponent matter (a regular lattice, a uniform mix, etc.). We apply the results to study nuclear burning in a {sup 12}C-{sup 16}O mixture. In this context, we present new calculations of the astrophysical S factors for carbon-oxygen and oxygen-oxygen fusion reactions. We show that the presence of a C-O lattice can strongly suppress carbon ignition in white dwarf cores and neutron star crusts at densities {rho}(greater-or-similar sign)3x10{sup 9} g cm{sup -3} and temperatures T(less-or-similar sign)10{sup 8} K.
- OSTI ID:
- 20863830
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. C, Nuclear Physics, Vol. 74, Issue 3; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevC.74.035803; (c) 2006 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0556-2813
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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