Probing Nuclear Physics with Neutron Star Mergers
With the first gravitational wave observation of the merger of two neutron stars (GW170817), scientists have definitive observations of the ejecta from this event. The broadband observations of this merger provide a window into the nuclear physics and, for the first-time, detailed nuclear-physics effects of the r-process can be distinguished in an astrophysical event.
In this workshop, we bring together experts in nuclear cross-sections, dense nuclear matter and neutrino physics with astrophysicists modeling the ejecta and emission from neutron star mergers and observers of neutron-star merger events to determine the potential links between the latest advances in nuclear physics on the observation of GW170817 and future neutron star mergers.