Reduced Chandrasekhar mass limit due to the fine-structure constant

Abstract

The electromagnetic interaction alters the Chandrasekhar mass limit by a factor which depends, as computed in the literature, on the atomic number of the positively charged nuclei present within the degenerate matter. Unfortunately, the methods employed for such computations break Lorentz invariance ab initio. By employing the methods of finite temperature relativistic quantum field theory, we show that in the leading order, the effect of electromagnetic interaction reduces the Chandrasekhar mass limit for non-general-relativistic, spherically symmetric white dwarfs by a universal factor of $(1-3\alpha/4\pi)$, $\alpha$ being the fine-structure constant.