International conference “Physics of neutron stars – 2017. 50 years after”

Abstract

This was the 11th gathering on neutron star physics in Saint Petersburg since 1988. The 2017 Conference was organized by the Theoretical Astrophysics Department of the Ioffe Institute and the Relativistic Astrophysics Department of the Sternberg Astronomical Institute. It commemorated the semicentenary of the discovery of pulsars. During these 50 years, the field of astrophysics of neutron stars has become a broad field covering all ranges of physical scales, from microscales characteristic of strong interactions to macroscales of neutron star sizes strongly affected by General Relativity. All branches of contemporary physics are involved in the research of astrophysical phenomena related to neutron stars, and observations throughout the entire range of electromagnetic spectra have been used to constrain fundamental physical theories. Towards the end of the 20th century, electromagnetic observations were joined by direct neutrino detections from a newly born neutron star (Supernova 1987a) and, between the end of the Conference and the publication of this volume, a long-awaited gravitational wave signal from a binary neutron star merger was detected for the first time, thus promoting neutron stars to the first class of astrophysical sources observed in the electromagnetic band, neutrinos, and gravitational waves. With many more detections of binary neutron star mergers to come, the next decade of the neutron star research is expected to be developing under great influence of the gravitational wave astronomy. In addition, the launch of telescopes of the next generation (proposed, planned and already operating) will shed light on many of the current mysteries, but surely it will also unveil new ones, making the near future even more stimulating than the previous five decades. List of Acknowledgments, Organizing committees, Invited speakers, Conference photo are available in this PDF.