Re: Two neutron stars on a collision course?

Crown-Horned Snorkack wrote:

> There is a very real obtainium strong enough to contain degenerate
> neutron matter indefinitely.
> 
> The gravity field of an ordinary neutron star.
> 
> It does contain neutrinos - briefly. The neutrinos from a supernova
> diffuse and leak away over the time period of a few tens of seconds.
> 
> If a neutron star is significantly expanded then it becomes far more
> transparent for neutrinos. So the neutrinos will escape in a few
> seconds or less.

Neutron star matter only becomes significantly opaque to neutrinos 
during "maximum scrunch," the point where the neutron star is formed and 
neutron degeneracy halts its collapse.  But this is only happening 
during a type II supernova, where you need the mass of the rest of a 
star to help guide the process -- and where the neutron star formation 
creates runaway fusion that results in the creation of all those 
neutrinos in the first place.

An already-formed neutron star isn't really opaque to neutrinos.

-- 
Erik Max Francis && max@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 && http://www.alcyone.com/max/
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