Gogny forces in the astrophysical context

Abstract

The most successful Gogny interactions of the D1 family, namely D1S, D1N and D1M, suffer the common problem of a too soft neutron matter equation of state at high density, which prevents them from predicting a maximal mass of neutron stars of two solar masses, as required by recent astronomical observations. To cure this deficiency, we have proposed recently a reparametrization of the D1M force by fine tuning the slope of the symmetry energy in such a way that it preserves the ground-state properties of D1M in finite nuclei and also describes successfully the global properties of neutron stars, in particular its maximal mass, in consonance with the observational data. In this contribution we revisit this reparametrization by discussing two modified Gogny forces, dubbed D1M$^*$ and D1M$^{**}$.