Physical Review Letters
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Crust Composition and the Shallow Heat Source in KS 1731–260
Author(s): R. Jain, E. F. Brown, H. Schatz, A. V. Afanasjev, M. Beard, L. R. Gasques, J. Grace, A. Heger, G. W. Hitt, W. R. Hix, R. Lau, W.-J. Ong, M. Wiescher, and Y. Xu
The presence of a strong shallow heat source of unknown origin in accreting neutron star crusts has been inferred by analyzing x-ray observations of their cooling in quiescence. We model the cooling of KS 1731–260 using realistic crust compositions and nuclear heating and cooling sources from detail… [Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 162701] Published Tue Oct 14, 2025
