Dense Plasmas, Nuclear Reactions and Astrophysics

A certain number of questions are raised to physicists and astrophysicists concerning : (1) the conditions under which stellar matter becomes a highly correlated plasma ; (2) the role of mass loss in the formation of dense matter ; (3) the evolution of white dwarfs accreting matter (with its consequences for the formation of compact X ray sources and pulsars) . 1 . Introduction.The solution of a large number of astrophysical problems depend on the understanding of the physical properties of dense matter . However, the expression dense matter does not refer to a simple domain in the plane of the state variables (T .p .) . (1) Dense matter can be defined as a highly correlated plasma . II we call a the radius of the ionic sphere, a highly correlated plasma is defined by the