- Quark-nova
A quark-nova is a hypothetical type of
supernova that could occur if aneutron star spontaneously collapsed to become aquark star . The concept of quark-novae was suggested by Dr. Rachid Ouyed [cite web|url=http://www.capca.ucalgary.ca/|title=Rachid Ouyed's webpage|accessdate=29 June|accessyear=2008] (University of Calgary, Canada) and Drs. Dey and Dey (Calcutta University, India). The quark-nova hypothesis has been mentioned in various publications [cite web|url=http://www.capca.ucalgary.ca/~rouyed/news.html|title=International News on the Quark-Nova|accessdate=30 July|accessyear=2008] .When a neutron star spins down, it could convert to a quark star through a process known as quark deconfinement. The resultant star would have almost free
quark s in its interior. The process would release immense amounts of energy, perhaps explaining the most energetic explosions in the universe; rough calculations have estimated that as much as 1053 ergs of energy could be released from the phase transition inside a neutron star. [cite web|url=http://www.citebase.org/abstract?id=oai%3AarXiv.org%3Aastro-ph%2F0105109|title=Theories of Quark-novae|accessdate=29 June|accessyear=2008] Quark-novae may be one cause ofgamma ray bursts . According to Jaikumar "et al" [cite web |url=http://arxiv.org/abs/nucl-th/0610013 |title=Nucleosynthesis in neutron-rich ejecta from Quark-Novae] , they may also be involved in producing heavy elements such as platinum through r-process nucleosynthesis.Rapidly spinning neutron stars with masses between 1.5 and 1.8 solar masses are theoretically the best candidates for conversion due to spin down of the star within a Hubble time. This amounts to a small fraction of the projected neutron star population. A conservative estimate based on this indicates that up to two quark-novae may occur in the observable universe each day.
Theoretically quark stars would be radio-quiet, so
radio-quiet neutron stars may be quark stars.Direct evidence for quark-novae is scant; however recent observations of supernovae
SN2006gy ,SN2005gj andSN2005ap may point to their existence. [ [http://astronomynow.com/080604Secondsupernovaepointtoquarkstars.html Astronomy Now Online - Second Supernovae Point to Quark Stars] ] [ [http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2008MNRAS.387.1193L Supernova SN2006gy as a first ever Quark Nova?] ]References
External links
* [http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Quark_Stars_Could_Produce_Biggest_Bang.html Quark Stars Could Produce Biggest Bang] (SpaceDaily) Jun 7, 2006
* [http://www.capca.ucalgary.ca/~bniebergal/webPHP/research.php?subdir=strangeQuarkStars Meissner Effect in Quark Stars] (University of Calgary)ee also
*
quark matter
*quark-degenerate matter
*hypernova
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