Multifragmentation reactions and properties of stellar matter at subnuclear densities

We point out the similarity of thermodynamic conditions reached in nuclear multifragmentation and in supernova explosions. We show that a statistical approach previously applied for nuclear multifragmentation reactions can also be used to describe the electroneutral stellar matter. Then properties of hot unstable nuclei extracted from the analysis of multifragmentation data can be used to determine a realistic nuclear composition of hot supernova matter.