Prof. Jaki Noronha-Hostler, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Abstract: With the recent measurements of 2 solar mass neutron stars and a mystery object from the companion in GW190814, evidence has begun to pile up that the speed of sound found within neutron stars may rapidly approach the speed of light. Using a new technique, we find a way to identify a sharp rise in the speed of sound using the binary love relation of inspiraling neutron stars. Additionally, we connect the neutron star equation of state to that in heavy-ion collision experiments at low beam energies and find that the experimental data also appears to be compatible with a large bump in the speed of sound.