https://doi.org/10.1140/epja/i2016-16063-8
Regular Article - Theoretical Physics
Observational constraints on neutron star masses and radii
1
Department of Astronomy and Joint Space-Science Institute, University of Maryland, 20742-2421, College Park, MD, USA
2
Center for Theoretical Astrophysics and Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1110 West Green Street, 61801-3080, Urbana, IL, USA
3
Department of Astronomy, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1002 West Green Street, 61801-3074, Urbana, IL, USA
* e-mail: miller@astro.umd.edu
Received:
19
August
2015
Revised:
15
February
2016
Accepted:
3
March
2016
Published online:
22
March
2016
Precise and reliable measurements of the masses and radii of neutron stars with a variety of masses would provide valuable guidance for improving models of the properties of cold matter with densities above the saturation density of nuclear matter. Several different approaches for measuring the masses and radii of neutron stars have been tried or proposed, including analyzing the X-ray fluxes and spectra of the emission from neutron stars in quiescent low-mass X-ray binary systems and thermonuclear burst sources; fitting the energy-dependent X-ray waveforms of rotation-powered millisecond pulsars, burst oscillations with millisecond periods, and accretion-powered millisecond pulsars; and modeling the gravitational radiation waveforms of coalescing double neutron star and neutron star - black hole binary systems. We describe the strengths and weaknesses of these approaches, most of which currently have substantial systematic errors, and discuss the prospects for decreasing the systematic errors in each method.
© SIF, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg, 2016
