- Title: An Anti-Glitch in a Magnetar
- Authors: R. F. Archibald, V. M. Kaspi, C. -Y. Ng, K. N. Gourgouliatos, D
- Title: An Anti-Glitch in a Magnetar
- Authors: R. F. Archibald, V. M. Kaspi, C. -Y. Ng, K. N. Gourgouliatos, D. Tsang, P. Scholz, A. P. Beardmore, N. Gehrels, & J. A. Kennea
- First Author’s Institution: Department of Physics, McGill University, Montreal QC, Canada
Pulsars are some of the universe’s best timekeepers. Formed during the supernova explosions of massive stars, pulsars are rapidly rotating neutron stars that possess strong magnetic fields (~1012 Gauss). For reference, that magnetic field could wipe your credit card from a distance half-way to the moon! A majority of pulsars observed from Earth appear as regularly spaced pulses of radio emission, with periods between 0.01 and 1 second.
These pulses are not due to an intrinsic turning on and off of the source, but rather to the alignment of the system and Earth. As energetic charged particles spiral along the strong magnetic field lines they emit a beam of radio synchrotron emission along the magnetic axis of the pulsar (see this astrobite for a review of synchrotron emission). However, just like on earth, this magnetic axis need not be aligned with the pulsar’s rotation axis (see schematic in Figure 1). The result of this misalignment is a rotating beam of radiation. In a situation very similar to that of a lighthouse, we will see this radiation only once per rotation period of the pulsar as it intersects the line of site to Earth.
The period of all pulsars gradually slows as the rotational energy of the neutron star goes into the radiation that we see. However, this effect can be measured and accounted for. By combining observa