Axisymmetric Magnetic Fields, Electron Capture and Pycnonuclear Reactions in Magnetized White Dwarfs

Edson Otoniel, Bruno Franzon, Manuel Malheiro, Stefan Schramm, Fridolin Weber

Published 2016-09-20Version 1

In this work, we study the properties of magnetized white dwarfs taking into account possible instabilities due to electron capture and pycnonuclear fusion reactions in the cores of such objects. The structure of white dwarfs is obtained by solving the Einstein-Maxwell equations with a poloidal magnetic field in a fully general relativistic approach. The stellar interior is composed of a regular crystal lattice made of carbon ions immersed in a degenerate relativistic electron gas. The onsets of electron capture reactions and pycnonuclear reactions are determined with and without magnetic fields. We find that magnetized white dwarfs violate the standard Chandrasekhar mass limit significantly, even when electron capture and pycnonuclear instabilities are present in the stellar interior. We obtain a maximum white dwarf mass of around $2.12\,M_{\odot}$ with a central magnetic field of $\sim 1.74\times 10^{14}$G, which indicates that magnetized white dwarfs may be the progenitor candidates of superluminous type Ia supernovae. Furthermore, we show that the critical density for pyconuclear fusion reactions limits the central white dwarf density up to $2.39\times 10^9$ g/cm$^3$ and, as a consequence, its equatorial radius cannot be smaller than $ R \sim 1600$ km. Finally, we find for magnetized white dwarfs with central magnetic field lower than $\sim 10^{13}$ ~G the usual phenomenology known in the literature: increasing the central magnetic field (the magnetic energy density), the central baryonic number density reduces and the stellar radius increases. However, for higher central magnetic fields (and higher masses), we have a new phenomenology for the star structure: increasing the magnetic field of the star, the central baryonic number density increases proportionally, since the equatorial radius decreases, making ultramagnetized white dwarfs more compact.