Measuring Mass and Radius of the Maximum-mass Nonrotating Neutron Star

The mass (M _TOV) and radius (R _TOV) of the maximum-mass nonrotating neutron star (NS) play a crucial role in constraining the elusive equation of state of cold dense matter and in predicting the fate of remnants from binary neutron star (BNS) mergers. In this study, we introduce a novel method to deduce these parameters by examining the mergers of second-generation (2G) black holes (BHs) with NSs. These 2G BHs are assumed to originate from supramassive neutron stars (SMNSs) formed in BNS mergers. Since the properties of the remnant BHs arising from the collapse of SMNSs follow a universal relation governed by M _TOV and R _TOV, we anticipate that by analyzing a series (~100 detections) of mass and spin measurements of the 2G BHs using the third-generation ground-based gravitational-wave detectors, M _TOV and R _TOV can be determined with a precision of ~0.01M _⊙ and ~0.6 km, respectively.