We study the presence of thermodynamic instabilities in a nuclear medium at finite temperature and density where nuclear phase transitions can take place. Such a phase transition is characterized by pure hadronic matter with both mechanical instability (fluctuations on the baryon density) that by chemical-diffusive instability (fluctuations on the electric charge concentration). Similarly to the liquid-gas phase transition, the nucleonic and the Δ-matter phase have a different isospin density in the mixed phase. In the liquid-gas phase transition, the process of producing a larger neutron excess in the gas phase is referred to as isospin fractionation. A similar effects can occur in the nucleon-Δ matter phase transition due essentially to a Δ- excess in the Δ-matter phase in asymmetric nuclear matter. In this context we also discuss the relevance of Δ-isobar and hyperon degrees of freedom in the bulk properties of the protoneutron stars at fixed entropy per baryon, in the presence and in the absence of trapped neutrinos.
Effect of the Coulomb interaction on the liquid-gas phase transition of nuclear matter
