JESTER Documentation

JAX-accelerated equation of state inference and TOV solvers

jester performs Bayesian inference on neutron star equations of state using GPU-accelerated TOV solvers through jax.

Note

Documentation is work in progress! Some sections may be incomplete or under active development. We appreciate your patience as we improve the documentation.

What’s in JESTER?

JESTER combines flexible EOS parametrizations with GPU-accelerated TOV solvers and modern Bayesian samplers. See the Overview guide for detailed explanations.

🧮 EOS Models

Parametrize the equation of state of nuclear matter

• Metamodel

• Metamodel + CSE

• Spectral expansion

⚙️ TOV Solvers

Integrate neutron star structure equations

• General Relativity

• Modified gravity theories

• Pressure anisotropy

🔭 Likelihood Constraints

Multi-messenger astronomical observations

• Gravitational waves

• NICER mass-radius

• Radio timing (mass measurements)

• Nuclear experiments (chiEFT)

📊 Samplers

GPU-accelerated Bayesian inference

• Sequential Monte Carlo

• Nested Sampling

• FlowMC (normalizing flows)

Installation

jester depends on a specific fork of blackjax for nested sampling support, which prevents publishing to PyPI. Install the latest version by cloning the repository:

git clone https://github.com/nuclear-multimessenger-astronomy/jester
cd jester
uv sync

Extra dependencies can be installed as follows:

uv sync --extra cuda12   # For GPU support (fast sampling)
uv sync --extra dev      # For developers (work on documentation, run tests,...)

To run Bayesian inference, make sure to install support for CUDA or upgrade jax according to the jax documentation page:

uv sync --extra cuda12

Contents

Overview

• Overview

Examples

• Basic Examples

Inference Guide

• Quick Start
  • Running your first inference
  • Result
  • Postprocessing
  • Next steps
• YAML configuration reference
  • Overview
  • Run Options
  • EOS Configuration
  • TOV Configuration
  • Prior Configuration
  • Likelihoods
  • Samplers
  • Data Paths (Optional)
  • Postprocessing
  • Complete Examples
  • Validation Rules
• JESTER Inference Workflow
  • Table of Contents
  • Overview
  • File Structure and Connections
  • Data Flow Through the System
  • Understanding the Main Components
  • Step-by-Step Execution
  • Developer Guide: Using and Extending
  • Summary

API Reference

• jesterTOV
  • jesterTOV.eos module
  • jesterTOV.tov module
  • jesterTOV.inference module
  • jesterTOV.utils module

Developer Guide

• Adding a New EOS Model
  • Architecture Overview
  • Step 1: Create EOS Class
  • Step 2: Update Configuration Schema
  • Step 3: Register in Transform Factory
  • Step 4: Create Prior File
  • Step 5: Write Tests
  • Step 6: Create Example Configuration
  • Step 7: Documentation
  • Checklist
  • Common Pitfalls
  • Need Help?
• Adding a New TOV Solver
  • Architecture Overview
  • Step 1: Create TOV Solver Class
  • Step 2: Update Configuration Schema
  • Step 3: Register in Transform Factory
  • Step 4: Create Prior File
  • Step 5: Write Tests
  • Step 6: Create Example Configuration
  • Step 7: Documentation
  • Checklist
  • Common Pitfalls
  • Need Help?
• Adding a New Likelihood
  • Architecture Overview
  • Step 1: Create Likelihood Class
  • Step 2: Add Data Loading Function
  • Step 3: Update Configuration Schema
  • Step 4: Register in Likelihood Factory
  • Step 5: Write Tests
  • Step 6: Create Example Configuration
  • Step 7: Documentation
  • Checklist
  • Common Pitfalls
  • Advanced: Resampling Likelihoods
  • Need Help?
• Inference Documentation Maintenance Guide
  • Overview
  • Auto-Generated Documentation
  • Manual Documentation
  • Documentation Structure
  • Testing Documentation
  • Version Control
  • Documentation Review
  • Common Pitfalls
  • Summary
• Citing Jester
  • Jester methods papers
  • Additional methods papers
  • List of papers that used jester

Indices and tables

• Index

• Module Index

• Search Page