Density-dependent quark mass model revisited: thermodynamic consistency, stability windows and stellar properties

In this work a density-dependent quark model is revisited, its thermodynamic consistency checked and the stability window for absolutely stable quark matter obtained. The hypotheses of both pure quark matter with equal quark chemical potentials and stellar matter subject to chemical stability and charge neutrality are investigated. The parameters that appear in the density-dependent mass and satisfy the Bodmer–Witten conjecture are then used to compute the masses and radii of strange stars. We show that the obtained values are compatible with the recently observed massive stars. (paper)