Innermost stable circular orbits around relativistic rotating stars

Abstract

We investigate the innermost stable circular orbit (ISCO) of a test particle moving on the equatorial plane around rotating relativistic stars such as neutron stars. First, we derive approximate analytic formulas for the angular velocity and circumferential radius at the ISCO making use of an approximate relativistic solution which is characterized by arbitrary mass, spin, mass quadrupole, current octapole and mass $2^4$-pole moments. Then, we show that the analytic formulas are accurate enough by comparing them with numerical results, which are obtained by analyzing the vacuum exterior around numerically computed geometries for rotating stars of polytropic equation of state. We demonstrate that contribution of mass quadrupole moment for determining the angular velocity and, in particular, the circumferential radius at the ISCO around a rapidly rotating star is as important as that of spin.