CAREER: Nuclear Matter from Chiral Effective Field Theory in the FRIB & Multimessenger Era

Ohio University, Athens OH

Investigators

Abstract

The new era in multimessenger astrophysics provides novel opportunities for the study of strongly interacting, dense matter. Observational and experimental campaigns will address longstanding fundamental questions, such as: What is the nature of matter at extreme temperatures and densities? What nuclear processes drive the birth, life, and death of stars? And where do heavy elements, such as gold, come from? In this broader landscape, this project will leverage recent advances in nuclear theory to develop novel microscopic models of hot and dense nuclear matter with statistically quantified theoretical uncertainties. The outcome will be rigorous interpretations of the wealth of forthcoming observational and experimental data to advance fundamental understanding of strongly interacting matter and the structure and evolution of neutron stars. Furthermore, the integrated education plan will enhance public awareness of and literacy in nuclear physics and astrophysics in southeastern Ohio’s Appalachian region through a generally accessible poster series and public learning events. This project will combine chiral effective field theory (EFT) of low-energy quantum chromodynamics with advances in many-body theory, Bayesian machine learning, and high-performance computing to significantly improve microscopic hot and dense matter predictions with comprehensive uncertainty quantification. These developments will be critical to mining and capitalizing on the anticipated observational and experimental data to guide the construction of improved chiral EFT implementations and microscopic EOS models. The physics goals include deriving cutting-edge constraints of the nuclear equation of state (EOS) from a wide range of modern chiral interactions using automated many-body perturbation theory and rigorously quantified EFT-based uncertainties. Furthermore, novel microscopic EOS with improved thermodynamics for simulations of core-collapse supernovae and neutron star mergers will be constructed, and their implications for neutron star properties will be studied. This research avenue is tightly connected to observational and experimental campaigns in the FRIB and multimessenger astronomy era. It will elucidate how predictive current microscopic EOS models are at densities between one and two times the nuclear saturation density, where chiral EFT, neutron star observation, and nuclear experiment intersect, among other important open questions in nuclear theory. This project advances the objectives of "Windows on the Universe: the Era of Multi-Messenger Astrophysics", one of the 10 Big Ideas for Future NSF Investments. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.