Recent pulsar results from AGILE

The AGILE satellite launched in April 2007 is a mission devoted to gamma-ray observations in the 30 MeV-50 GeV range, with simultaneous X-ray imaging in the 18-60 keV band. AG- ILE is characterized by the smallest deadtime ever achieved for gamma-ray detection (∼200 microseconds) and absolute time tagging few microseconds precision. We present the first results on gamma-ray pulsars obtained during the early stages of the AGILE mission. More than 10,000 gamma-ray photons from the known pulsars Vela, Geminga, Crab and J1709-4429 have been collected for timing performances evaluation and calibration of the Gamma-Ray Imaging Detector (GRID). These early observations open new perspectives on the multiwavelength studies of pulsars lightcurves. The wide field-of-view of the GRID (∼1/5 of the sky) permits long monitoring campaigns on each target (1-2 months) allowing the study of timing instabilities and possibly related high-energy emission fluctuations of gamma-ray sources. In fact the Vela pulsar underwent a glitch during the AGILE calibration observations, thus offering for the first time the possibility to obtain high-energy data during such a phenomenon. Photon statistics for gamma-ray pulsation searches is constantly increasing and gives us the possibility to detect several young and energetic radio pulsars discovered after the end of the CGRO mission.