https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/s10053-026-01165-4
Research - Plasmas
Nucleus-acoustic shock structures in degenerate quantum plasmas
Department of Physics, Jahangirnagar University, 1342, Savar, Dhaka, Bangladesh
a
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Received:
10
December
2025
Accepted:
10
April
2026
Published online:
3
May
2026
Abstract
A rigorous theoretical investigation of nucleus-acoustic shock structures in a warm degenerate quantum plasma has been done. The plasma model consists of inertialess, degenerate electrons, along with two mobile, viscous nuclear species: light and heavy nuclei. Both light and heavy nuclei contribute to the inertia of the plasma system, and the electron degeneracy pressure provides the restoring force. The reductive perturbation method is used to reduce the set of governing equations that describe our plasma system into the well-known equation, so-called the Burgers equation. The latter gives the solution of shock structures. Both the non-relativistic and ultra-relativistic cases for the warm degenerate electron species are considered. The effects of the non-relativistic and ultra-relativistic electrons have significantly changed the properties (viz., phase speed, amplitude, width) of nucleus-acoustic shock pulses. It is observed that the viscous effect of both light and heavy nuclei is the source of dissipation, which is responsible for the generation of shock pulses. Our analysis indicates that the plasma systems under consideration support shock structures with positive potential. The amplitude of nucleus-acoustic shock pulses is found to be independent of the viscosity of both light and heavy nuclei, whereas the width of the shock waves increases with viscosity in both cases. Both the amplitude and width of nucleus-acoustic shock structures are found to increase with the number density of the heavy nucleus and with increasing electron temperature. In contrast, the amplitude decreases while the width increases as the mass of the heavy nucleus becomes larger. Furthermore, both the amplitude and width of the shock waves decrease with increasing energy ratio of the light nuclei for both electron species. This model advances the theoretical understanding of shock dynamics and nonlinear wave propagation in ultra-dense, degenerate quantum plasmas by accounting for two viscous and mobile nuclear species. The findings yield significant insights into thermal evolution, energy dissipation, and the formation of nonlinear structures within the interiors of compact astrophysical objects, including neutron stars and white dwarfs.
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© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to EDP Sciences, SIF and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2026
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
