Radio pulsar spin-down stability

Observations show that almost all pulsars exhibit measurable departures from the cubic law predicted for the slow down. This has been largely attributed to rotational irregularities – timing noise, glitches, and precession. Here, we present an analysis of ‘reliable’ frequency second-derivative for 2...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Advances in space research 2007, Vol.40 (10), p.1517-1521
Main Author: Urama, Johnson O.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Pulsars: general
Stars: neutron
Citations: Items that this one cites
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Summary:Observations show that almost all pulsars exhibit measurable departures from the cubic law predicted for the slow down. This has been largely attributed to rotational irregularities – timing noise, glitches, and precession. Here, we present an analysis of ‘reliable’ frequency second-derivative for 262 radio pulsars having characteristic ages ∼10 3–10 10 yr and periods in the range ∼1.6 ms to 4 s. We find a high degree of correlation between the value predicted by dipole braking mechanism, ν ¨ dipole , and the measured value, ν ¨ . We argue that the relationship is suggestive of some other systematic process(es) in the pulsar spin-down in addition to the magnetic dipole mechanism and the timing noise. Based on this relationship we are able to quantify the rate of instability in radio pulsars.
ISSN:0273-1177
1879-1948
DOI:10.1016/j.asr.2007.01.048