2011ApJ...730...31R

High-mass compact stars have been reported recently in the literature, providing strong constraints on the properties of the ultra dense matter beyond the saturation nuclear density. In view of these results, the calculations of quark star or hybrid star equilibrium structure must be compatible with the provided observational data. But since the equations of state used in describing quark matter are in general too soft in comparison with the equation of states used to describe the hadronic or nuclear matter, the calculated quark star models presented in the literature are in general not suitable to explain the stability of highly-compact massive objects. In this work, we present the calculations of a spherically symmetric quark star structure by using an equation of state that takes into account the superconducting color-flavor locked phase of the strange quark matter. In addition, some fundamental aspects of QCD (asymptotic freedom and confinement) are considered by means of a phenomenological description of the deconfined quark phase, the density-dependent quark mass model. The quark matter behavior introduced by this model stiffens the corresponding equation of state. We thus investigate the influence of this model on the mass-radius diagram of quark stars. We obtain massive quark stars due to the stiffness of the equation of state, when a reasonable parameterization of the color superconducting gap is used. Models of quark stars enveloped by a nucleonic crust composed of a nuclear lattice embedded in an electron gas, with nuclei close to neutron drip line, are also discussed.