Liquid Drop Model for Nuclear Matter in the Low Density Limit

We consider the liquid drop model with a positive background density in the thermodynamic limit. We prove a two-term asymptotics for the ground state energy per unit volume in the dilute limit. Our proof justifies the expectation that optimal configurations consist of droplets of unit size that arrange themselves according to minimizers for the Jellium problem for point particles. In particular, we provide the first rigorous derivation of what is known as the gnocchi phase in astrophysics.