Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit

The Tolman -Oppenheimer - Volkoff limit ( TOV ) is an upper bound on the mass stellar objects, which consist of degenerate neutron matter ( neutron stars ). It is analogous to the Chandrasekhar limit for white dwarfs.

The limit was first calculated in 1939 by Robert Oppenheimer and Volkoff George Michael on the basis of the work of Richard C. Tolman. Oppenheimer and Volkoff assumed that the neutrons of a neutron star in the form of a cold, degenerate Fermi gas. This resulted in a mass limit of 0.71 solar masses., Modern estimates are in the range from 1.5 to 3.2 solar masses. The uncertainty stems from the fact that the equations of state for dense hadronic matter are not yet precisely known. In April 2013 Antoniadis and staff announced that its investigation of the neutron star PSR J0348 0432 system in a mass of 2.01 ± 0.04 solar masses revealed.

Below the limit of the weight of the neutron star is supported by short-range neutron -neutron interactions, which are mediated by the strong interaction and the degeneracy pressure of the neutrons. When the TOV limit is exceeded, the object collapses into a black hole or, if it is stabilized by the quark degeneracy pressure to a quark star.

Since the properties of these hypothetical degenerate quark matter are even less understood than that of the degenerate neutron matter, go most astrophysicists because of the absence of evidence to the contrary, assume that neutron stars above the TOV limit collapse directly into a black hole.

Swell

• Stellar physics