Hot neutron stars and their equation of state

A set of microscopic, covariant density-functional, and nonrelativistic Skyrme-type equations of state is employed to study the structure of purely nucleonic neutron stars at finite temperature. After examining the agreement with presently available astrophysical observational constraints, we find that the magnitude of thermal effects depends on the nucleon effective mass as well as on the stiffness of the cold equation of state. We evidence a fairly small but model-dependent effect of finite temperature on stellar stability that is correlated with the relative thermal pressure inside the star.