Emission and rotational variability in pulsars.
Abstract
The radio emission process in pulsars is poorly understood. However, pulsar timing is successfully used in extracting exciting science from radio pulsars and their environments. We are now approaching the point where the limits in our understanding of pulsar emission affect the precision of pulsar timing experiments. State-switching and intermittent pulsars both show correlated changes between the shape of the average pulse profile and the spin-down rate (first derivative of the rotational period). The spin-down rate changes have been shown to be related to changes in the torque imparted on the neutron star by magnetospheric currents. A comprehensive understanding of this variability will lead to improved timing models and, therefore, reduced timing residuals. Such advances are vital to the direct detection of gravitational waves and tests of fundamental physics. We have applied new variability detection techniques to various slow and millisecond pulsars, and the results will be presented here.
- Publication:
-
American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts #225
- Pub Date:
- January 2015
- Bibcode:
- 2015AAS...22542104B