SS Crust
| Category | Progenitor | Type | Energy Mechanism | Emission Mechanism | Counterparts | References | Brief Comments | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| LF Radio | HF Radio | Microwave | Terahertz | Optical/IR | X-rays | Gamma-rays | Gravitational Waves | Neutrinos | |||||||
| Collapse | Strange Star Crust | Single | Mag. reconnection | Curv. | Yes | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | Yes | -- | https://arxiv.org/pdf/1805.04448.pdf | None |
Definitions: LF Radio (3 MHz to 3 GHz); HF Radio (3 GHz to 30 GHz); Microwave (30 to 300 GHz)
Model Description
Charge separation in strange quark stars can induce large electric fields emanating from their core, which, through polarization of nearby surrounding hadrons, can lead to the formation of a hadronic crust around the star. Should the strange star accrete a sufficient amount of matter, the hadrons in the crust will tunnel across the Coulomb barrier, to the strange quark matter (SQM) core, where they too are converted to SQM. This accretion heats the core, hastens the tunnelling process, and eventually and inevitably leads to the collapse of the hadronic crust. As it collapses, the magnetic field lines associated with the crust are dragged with the matter, causing a disruption in the field lines of the SS core. Thus, via magnetic reconnection, electron-positron pairs are accelerated to ultra-relativistic speeds along the magnetic field lines, generating a thin shell of relativistic particles that accelerate around the bare SQM core to emit curvature radiation. Even a small portion of the magnetic energy held in the polar cap region of the SS core would be sufficient to power an FRB and the timescales of collapse are consistent with observations.