Cococubed.com Stellar Equations Of State

Home

Astronomy research
Software instruments
Stellar equation of states
EOS with ionization
EOS for supernovae
Chemical potentials
Stellar atmospheres

Voigt Function
Jeans escape
Polytropic stars
Cold white dwarfs

Cold neutron stars
Stellar opacities
Neutrino energy loss rates
Ephemeris routines
Fermi-Dirac functions

Polyhedra volume
Plane - cube intersection
Coating an ellipsoid

Nuclear reaction networks
Nuclear statistical equilibrium
Laminar deflagrations
CJ detonations
ZND detonations

Fitting to conic sections
Unusual linear algebra
Derivatives on uneven grids

Supernova light curves
Exact Riemann solutions
1D PPM hydrodynamics
Hydrodynamic test cases
Galactic chemical evolution

Universal two-body problem
Circular and elliptical 3 body
The pendulum
Phyllotaxis

MESA
MESA-Web
FLASH

Zingale's software
Brown's dStar
GR1D code
Herwig's NuGRID
Meyer's NetNuc
Presentations
Illustrations
Public Outreach
Education materials
2022 ASU Solar Systems Astronomy
2022 ASU Energy in Everyday Life

AAS Journals
2022 Earendel, A Highly Magnified Star
2022 TV Columbae, Micronova
2022 White Dwarfs and 12C(α,γ)16O
2022 Black Hole mass spectrum
2022 MESA VI
2022 MESA in Don't Look Up
2022 MESA Marketplace
2012-2023 MESA Schools
2022 MESA Classroom
2021 Bill Paxton, Tinsley Prize

Contact: F.X.Timmes
my one page vitae,
full vitae,
research statement, and
teaching statement.

Before using the software instruments below, perhaps glance at the articles that describe them. The first law of thermodynamics $${\rm dE = T \ dS + {P\over \rho^2} \ d\rho} \label{eq1} \tag{1}$$ is an exact differential, which requires that the thermodynamic relations \eqalignno { {\rm P} \ & = \ {\rm \rho^2 \ \dfrac{\partial E}{\partial \rho} \Biggm|_T \ + \ T \ \dfrac{\partial P}{\partial T} \Biggm|_{\rho} } & (2) \cr {\rm \dfrac{\partial E}{\partial T} \Biggm|_{\rho}} \ & = \ {\rm T \ \dfrac{\partial S}{\partial T} \Biggm|_{\rho} } & (3) \cr {\rm - \dfrac{\partial S}{\partial \rho} \Biggm|_T } \ & = \ {\rm {1 \over \rho^2} \ \dfrac{\partial P}{\partial T} \Biggm|_{\rho} } & (4) \cr } be satisfied. An equation of state is thermodynamically consistent if all three of these identities are true. Thermodynamic inconsistency may manifest itself in the unphysical buildup (or decay) of the entropy (or temperature) during numerical simulations of what should be an adiabatic flow.

When the temperature and density are the natural thermodynamic variables to use, the appropriate thermodynamic potential is the Helmholtz free energy $${\rm F = E - T \ S} \hskip 0.5in {\rm dF = -S \ dT + {P \over \rho^2} \ d\rho} \label{eq5}$$ With the pressure defined as $${\rm P \ = \ \rho^2 \ \dfrac{\partial F}{\partial \rho} \Biggm|_T } \label{eq6} \tag{6}$$ the first of the Maxwell relations (Eq. 2) is automatically satisfied, as substitution of Eq. (5) into Eq. (6) demonstrates. With the entropy defined as $${\rm S \ = \ -\dfrac{\partial F}{\partial T} \Biggm|_{\rho} } \label{eq7} \tag{7}$$ the second of the Maxwell relations (Eq. 3) is automatically satisfied, as substitution of Eq. (5) into Eq. (7) demonstrates. The requirement that the mixed partial derivatives commute $${\rm \dfrac{\partial^2 F}{\partial T \ \partial \rho} \ = \ \dfrac{\partial F}{\partial \rho \ \partial T} } \label{eq8} \tag{8}$$ ensures that the third of the thermodynamic identity (Eq. 4) is satisfied, as substitution of Eq. (5) into Eq. (8) shows.

Consider any interpolating function for the Helmholtz free energy $F(\rho,{\rm T})$ which satisfies Eq. (8). Thermodynamic consistency is guaranteed as long as Eq. (6) is used first to evaluate the pressure, Eq. (7) is used second to evaluate the entropy, and finally Eq. (5) is used to evaluate the internal energy. In fact, this procedure is almost too robust! The interpolated values may be a horribly inaccurate but they will be thermodynamically consistent.

Here then are bzip2 tarballs of six stellar interior equations of state:

 helmholtz.tbz nadyozhin.tbz iben.tbz weaver.tbz arnett.tbz timmes.tbz

Also see Josiah Schwab's python-helmholtz for the Helmholtz equation of state, and Matt Coleman's port of the Helmholtz equation of state to python helmeos.

The Skye EOS = an improved Helmholtz EOS for the non-interacting parts + an improved Potekhin & Chabrier EOS for the Coulomb plama parts + auto-differentiation. Its the bees knees for ionized plasmas as of 2021. Skye is avaliable at https://github.com/adamjermyn/Skye, and the article is described more on the thermodynamics research page.

The Helmholtz EOS implements the formalism above on a grid, executes the fastest (memory is faster than cpu), displays perfect thermodynamic consistency, and has a maximum error on the default grid of 10$^{-6}$. Helmholtz is the stellar EOS of choice in the FLASH software instrument and a backplane of the EOS module in the MESA software instrument. The Helmholtz free energy data file provided spans 10$^{-12}$ ≤ density (g cm$^{-3}$) ≤ 10$^{15}$ and 10$^{3}$ ≤ temperature (K) ≤ 10$^{13}$ at 20 points per decade. The Nadyozhin EOS is the fastest of the analytic routines, has very good thermodynamic consistency, a maximum error of 10$^{-5}$, and is also avaliable in FLASH. The Timmes EOS is as slow as molasses during a North Dakota winter, but it computes the non-interacting electron-positron equation of state with no approximations, is exact to machine precision in IEEE double precision arithmetic, has excellent thermodynamic consistency, and serves as the reference point for comparisons to the other EOS routines. In fact, the Helmholtz free energy table used by the Helmholtz EOS is calculated from the Timmes EOS.

There are times when a simpler cold fermi gas EOS is a wonderful thing. Such an EOS is in cold_fermi_gas.tbz. One can see this equation of state in action on this cold white dwarf page.

Please cite the relevant references if you publish a piece of work that use these codes, pieces of these codes, or modified versions of them. Offer co-authorship as appropriate.