Constraints on the skewness coefficient of symmetric nuclear matter within the nonlinear relativistic mean field model

Abstract

Within the nonlinear relativistic mean field (NL-RMF) model, we show that both the pressure of symmetric nuclear matter at supra-saturation densities and the maximum mass of neutron stars are sensitive to the skewness coefficient $J_0$ of symmetric nuclear matter. Using experimental constraints on the pressure of symmetric nuclear matter at supra-saturation densities from flow data in heavy ion collisions and the astrophysical observation of a large mass neutron star PSR J0348+0432, with the former favoring a smaller $J_0$ while the latter a larger $J_0$, we extract a constraint of $-494\mathrm{MeV}\le J_0\le -10\mathrm{MeV}$ based on the NL-RMF model. This constraint is compared with the results obtained in other analyses.

Comments: 8 pages, 4 figures. Discussions added. Accepted version to appear in Nuclear Science and Techniques