Paper detail

Gravitational collapse of a susy star

The evidence for a positive vacuum energy in our universe suggests that we might be living in a false vacuum destined to ultimately decay to a true vacuum free of dark energy. At present the simplest example of such a universe is one that is exactly supersymmetric (susy). It is expected that the nucleation rate of critically sized susy bubbles will be enhanced in regions of high density such as in degenerate stars. The consequent release of energy stored in Pauli towers provides a possible model for gamma ray bursts. Whether or not all or any of the currently observed bursts are due to this mechanism, it is important to define the signatures of this susy phase transition. After such a burst, due to the lifting of degeneracy pressure, the star would be expected to collapse into a black hole even though its mass is below the Chandrasekhar limit. Previous studies have treated the star as fully releasing its stored energy before the collapse. In this article we make an initial investigation of the effects of the collapse during the gamma ray emission.