  The thermal evolution of properties of neutron rich asymmetric nuclear matter
such as entropy density, internal energy density, free energy density and
pressure are studied in the non-relativistic mean field theory using finite
range effective interactions. In this framework the thermal evolution of
nuclear matter properties is directly connected to the neutron and proton
effective mass properties. Depending on the magnitude of neutron-proton
effective mass splittings, two distinct behaviours in the thermal evolution of
nuclear matter properties are noticed.
