# REFERENCES

Usov Replies: In the recent Letter  I have shown that the Coulomb barrier at the quark surface of a hot strange star may be a powerful source of $`e^+e^{}`$ pairs. These are created in a very strong electric field, $`EE_{\mathrm{cr}}1.3\times 10^{16}`$ V cm<sup>-1</sup>, of the barrier and flow away from the stellar surface. The flux of $`e^+e^{}`$ pairs from the quark surface with a given temperature was calculated in Ref. . In the Comment  Mitra claims that the process of pair creation rapidly leads to quenching of the surface electric field, and in a steady state, the value of $`E`$ at the quark surface is well below the critical value, $`EE_{\mathrm{cr}}`$. However, this claim is incorrect because the electric field of the Coulomb barrier at the quark surface cannot be quenched for a long time in principle. The point is that there are some electrons in quark matter to neutralize the electric charge . The electrons are bound to the quark matter by the electromagnetic interaction and not by the strong force, and the Coulomb barrier with a very strong electric field has to exist at the quark surface to prevent the electrons from escaping to infinity . Even if the Coulomb barrier is quenched at some moment, the electron distribution would extend very fast up to the distance $`\mathrm{\Delta }R10^{10}`$ cm above the quark surface, and the Coulomb barrier would be restored in $`\mathrm{\Delta }R/c3\times 10^{21}`$ s. Here, it is taken into account that the Fermi energy of electrons in quark matter is much higher than their rest energy, $`\epsilon _\mathrm{F}mc^2`$, and the mean velocity of electrons is about the speed of light $`c`$ . The surface layer with a very strong electric field at the quark surface is similar, in some respects, to a parallel plate capacitor which is connected to a voltage source. The electrons of quark matter may be considered as such a source which gives a potential drop of $`\epsilon _\mathrm{F}/e2\times 10^7`$ V across the Coulomb barrier at the quark-matter surface , where $`e`$ is the electron charge.

The energy of created electrons, $`\epsilon \epsilon __\mathrm{F}2mc^2`$, is smaller than the mean energy of electrons in the surface layer with a very strong electric field, $`EE_{\mathrm{cr}}`$, where the pair creation process occurs . Therefore, the pair creation leads to cooling of electrons in the surface layer. The thermal energy which is stored in electrons in this layer and may be converted into the energy of created pairs is $`W_e4\pi R^2\mathrm{\Delta }Rn_e(kT_\mathrm{S})^2/\epsilon __\mathrm{F}`$, where $`R10^6`$ cm is the radius of the star, $`n_e3\times 10^{34}`$ cm<sup>-3</sup> is the density of electrons in quark matter and $`\epsilon __\mathrm{F}20`$ MeV . Even if the surface temperature $`T_\mathrm{S}`$ is as high as $`10^{11}`$ K, the value of $`W_e`$ is small, $`W_e10^{32}`$ ergs, i.e. the thermal energy of electrons in the surface layer cannot support a high $`e^+e^{}`$ emission from a strange star for a long time. To find the time evolution of both the surface temperature of a hot strange star and its luminosity in $`e^+e^{}`$ pairs it is necessary to solve the problem of heat transfer from the stellar interior to the quark-matter surface.

It is true that the time scale for diffusion of both electrons and photons from the interior of a strange star to its surface is very large, $`t_e10^{12}10^{13}`$ s. For a very hot strange star, the energy transport can take place on a time scale of $`10`$ s not only via neutrinos or other particles having a weak interaction cross-section, and also via convection. Indeed, when a hot strange star is cooling from its surface because of the pair production, a cold dense layer forms in the surface vicinity. This layer is unstable with respect to convective disturbances  if the Rayleigh number $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{R}}=\alpha g\mathrm{\Delta }Th^3/k\nu `$ is larger than $`10^3`$, where $`g10^{14}`$ cm s<sup>-2</sup> is the acceleration of gravity at the strange-star surface, $`k`$ is the thermometric conductivity, $`\nu `$ is the kinematic viscosity, $`\alpha `$ is the coefficient of thermal expansion, $`\mathrm{\Delta }T`$ is the temperature change in the layer and $`h`$ is the depth of the layer. At $`\mathrm{\Delta }TT10^{11}`$ K, we have  $`k0.1`$ cm<sup>2</sup> s<sup>-1</sup>, $`\nu 1`$ cm<sup>2</sup> s<sup>-1</sup>, $`\alpha 10^{14}`$ K<sup>-1</sup> and $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{R}}10^{12}(h/1\mathrm{cm})^3`$. In this case, the surface layer which is initially isothermal begins to manifest convective behavior, $`\stackrel{~}{\mathrm{R}}10^3`$, in $`h^2/k10^5`$ s when the depth of cooled quark matter is $`h10^3`$ cm. Since a buoyancy force per unit volume is $`g\mathrm{\Delta }\rho =g\alpha \rho \mathrm{\Delta }T`$, the time-scale for the convection is roughly $`t_c(R/\alpha g\mathrm{\Delta }T)^{1/2}0.003`$ s, here $`\rho `$ is the quark-matter density. This is a very rapid rate of the thermal energy transport which is able to support a very high temperature, $`T__\mathrm{S}`$ a few $`\times 10^{10}`$ K, at the surface of a young strange star at least for a few seconds after the strange star formation. A detailed consideration of both the thermal energy transport and the luminosity of a very hot strange star in $`e^+e^{}`$ pairs is under way and will be addressed elsewhere.

V.V. Usov

Department of Condensed Matter Physics

Weizmann Institute of Science

Rehovot 76100, Israel

Received

PACS numbers: 97.60.-s, 12.38.Mh