Pulsar - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A pulsar is a highly magnetized, rotating neutron star

Neutron star

A neutron star is a type of stellar remnant that can result from the gravitational collapse of a massive star during a Type II, Type Ib or Type Ic supernova event. Such stars are composed almost entirely of neutrons, which are subatomic particles without electrical charge and with a slightly larger...

that emits a beam of electromagnetic radiation

Electromagnetic radiation

Electromagnetic radiation is a form of energy that exhibits wave-like behavior as it travels through space...

. The radiation can only be observed when the beam of emission is pointing towards the Earth. This is called the lighthouse effect and gives rise to the pulsed nature that gives pulsars their name. Because neutron stars are very dense objects, the rotation period and thus the interval between observed pulses is very regular. For some pulsars, the regularity of pulsation is as precise as an atomic clock

Atomic clock

An atomic clock is a clock that uses an electronic transition frequency in the microwave, optical, or ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum of atoms as a frequency standard for its timekeeping element...

. The observed periods of their pulses range from 1.4 millisecond

Millisecond

A millisecond is a thousandth of a second.10 milliseconds are called a centisecond....

s to 8.5 seconds. A few pulsars are known to have planets orbiting them, such as PSR B1257+12

PSR B1257+12

PSR B1257+12, sometimes abbreviated as PSR 1257+12, is a pulsar located roughly 2000 light-years from the Sun. In 2007, it was confirmed that three extrasolar planets orbit the pulsar.- Pulsar :...

. Werner Becker of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics

Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics

The Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics is a Max Planck Institute, located in Garching, near Munich, Germany.In 1991 the Max Planck Institute for Physics and Astrophysics split up into the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, the Max Planck Institute for Physics and the...

said in 2006, "The theory of how pulsars emit their radiation is still in its infancy, even after nearly forty years of work."

Formation

The events leading to the formation of a pulsar begin when the core of a massive star is compressed during a supernova

Supernova

A supernova is a stellar explosion that is more energetic than a nova. It is pronounced with the plural supernovae or supernovas. Supernovae are extremely luminous and cause a burst of radiation that often briefly outshines an entire galaxy, before fading from view over several weeks or months...

, which collapses into a neutron star. The neutron star retains most of its angular momentum

Angular momentum

In physics, angular momentum, moment of momentum, or rotational momentum is a conserved vector quantity that can be used to describe the overall state of a physical system...

, and since it has only a tiny fraction of its progenitor's radius (and therefore its moment of inertia

Moment of inertia

In classical mechanics, moment of inertia, also called mass moment of inertia, rotational inertia, polar moment of inertia of mass, or the angular mass, is a measure of an object's resistance to changes to its rotation. It is the inertia of a rotating body with respect to its rotation...

is sharply reduced), it is formed with very high rotation speed. A beam of radiation

Radiation

In physics, radiation is a process in which energetic particles or energetic waves travel through a medium or space. There are two distinct types of radiation; ionizing and non-ionizing...

is emitted along the magnetic axis of the pulsar, which spins along with the rotation of the neutron star. The magnetic axis of the pulsar determines the direction of the electromagnetic beam, with the magnetic axis not necessarily being the same as its rotational axis. This misalignment causes the beam to be seen once for every rotation of the neutron star, which leads to the "pulsed" nature of its appearance. The beam originates from the rotational energy

Rotational energy

The rotational energy or angular kinetic energy is the kinetic energy due to the rotation of an object and is part of its total kinetic energy...

of the neutron star, which generates an electrical field from the movement of the very strong magnetic field, resulting in the acceleration of protons and electrons on the star surface and the creation of an electromagnetic beam emanating from the poles of the magnetic field. This rotation slows down over time as electromagnetic

Electromagnetic radiation

Electromagnetic radiation is a form of energy that exhibits wave-like behavior as it travels through space...

power is emitted. When a pulsar's spin period slows down sufficiently, the radio pulsar mechanism is believed to turn off (the so-called "death line"). This turn-off seems to take place after about 10–100 million years, which means of all the neutron stars in the 13.6 billion year age of the universe, around 99% no longer pulsate. To date, the slowest observed pulsar has a period of 8.5 seconds.

Discovery

The first pulsar was observed on November 28, 1967 by Jocelyn Bell Burnell

Jocelyn Bell Burnell

Susan Jocelyn Bell Burnell, DBE, FRS, FRAS , is a British astrophysicist. As a postgraduate student she discovered the first radio pulsars with her thesis supervisor Antony Hewish. She was president of the Institute of Physics from October 2008 until October 2010, and was interim president...

and Antony Hewish

Antony Hewish

Antony Hewish FRS is a British radio astronomer who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1974 for his work on the development of radio aperture synthesis and its role in the discovery of pulsars...

. Initially baffled as to the seemingly unnatural regularity of its emissions, they dubbed their discovery LGM-1, for "little green men

Little green men

Little green men is the stereotypical portrayal of extraterrestrials as little humanoid-like creatures with green skin and sometimes with antennae on their heads. The term is also sometimes used to describe gremlins, mythical creatures known for causing problems in airplanes and mechanical devices...

" (a name for intelligent beings of extraterrestrial origin

Extraterrestrial life

Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...

). While the hypothesis that pulsars were beacons from extraterrestrial civilizations was never taken very seriously, some discussed the far-reaching implications if it turned out to be true. Their pulsar was later dubbed CP 1919, and is now known by a number of designators including PSR 1919+21, PSR B1919+21 and PSR J1921+2153. Although CP 1919 emits in radio wavelengths

Radio waves

Radio waves are a type of electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum longer than infrared light. Radio waves have frequencies from 300 GHz to as low as 3 kHz, and corresponding wavelengths from 1 millimeter to 100 kilometers. Like all other electromagnetic waves,...

, pulsars have, subsequently, been found to emit in visible light, X-ray

X-ray

X-radiation is a form of electromagnetic radiation. X-rays have a wavelength in the range of 0.01 to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 petahertz to 30 exahertz and energies in the range 120 eV to 120 keV. They are shorter in wavelength than UV rays and longer than gamma...

, and/or gamma ray

Gamma ray

Gamma radiation, also known as gamma rays or hyphenated as gamma-rays and denoted as γ, is electromagnetic radiation of high frequency . Gamma rays are usually naturally produced on Earth by decay of high energy states in atomic nuclei...

wavelengths.

The word "pulsar" is a contraction of "pulsating star", and first appeared in print in 1968:
The suggestion that pulsars were rotating neutron stars was put forth independently by Thomas Gold

Thomas Gold

Thomas Gold was an Austrian-born astrophysicist, a professor of astronomy at Cornell University, a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the Royal Society . Gold was one of three young Cambridge scientists who in the 1950s proposed the now mostly abandoned 'steady...

and Franco Pacini in 1968, and was soon proven beyond reasonable doubt by the discovery of a pulsar with a very short (33-millisecond

Millisecond

A millisecond is a thousandth of a second.10 milliseconds are called a centisecond....

) pulse period in the Crab nebula

Crab Nebula

The Crab Nebula is a supernova remnant and pulsar wind nebula in the constellation of Taurus...

.

In 1974, Antony Hewish became the first astronomer to be awarded the Nobel Prize in physics

Nobel Prize in Physics

The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded once a year by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895 and awarded since 1901; the others are the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Peace Prize, and...

. Considerable controversy is associated with the fact that Professor Hewish was awarded the prize while Bell, who made the initial discovery while she was his Ph.D student, was not. Bell claims no bitterness upon this point, supporting the decision of the Nobel prize committee.

Subsequent history

In 1974, Joseph Hooton Taylor, Jr.

Joseph Hooton Taylor, Jr.

Joseph Hooton Taylor, Jr. is an American astrophysicist and Nobel Prize in Physics laureate for his discovery with Russell Alan Hulse of a "new type of pulsar, a discovery that has opened up new possibilities for the study of gravitation."...

and Russell Hulse discovered for the first time a pulsar in a binary system

Binary star

A binary star is a star system consisting of two stars orbiting around their common center of mass. The brighter star is called the primary and the other is its companion star, comes, or secondary...

, PSR B1913+16. This pulsar orbits another neutron star with an orbital period of just eight hours. Einstein

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...

's theory of general relativity

General relativity

General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

predicts that this system should emit strong gravitational radiation, causing the orbit to continually contract as it loses orbital energy. Observations of the pulsar soon confirmed this prediction, providing the first ever evidence of the existence of gravitational waves. As of 2004, observations of this pulsar continue to agree with general relativity. In 1993, the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Taylor and Hulse for the discovery of this pulsar.

In 1982, Don Backer led a group which discovered PSR B1937+21

PSR B1937+21

PSR B1937+21 is a pulsar located in the constellation Vulpecula a few degrees in the sky away from the first discovered pulsar, PSR B1919+21. The name PSR B1937+21 is derived from the word "pulsar" and the declination and right ascension at which it is located, with the "B" indicating that the...

, a pulsar with a rotation period of just 1.6 milliseconds. Observations soon revealed that its magnetic field was much weaker than ordinary pulsars, while further discoveries cemented the idea that a new class of object, the "millisecond pulsar

Millisecond pulsar

A millisecond pulsar is a pulsar with a rotational period in the range of about 1-10 milliseconds. Millisecond pulsars have been detected in the radio, X-ray, and gamma ray portions of the electromagnetic spectrum. The origin of millisecond pulsars is still unknown...

s" (MSPs) had been found. MSPs are believed to be the end product of X-ray binaries

X-ray binary

X-ray binaries are a class of binary stars that are luminous in X-rays.The X-rays are produced by matter falling from one component, called the donor to the other component, called the accretor, which is compact: a white dwarf, neutron star, or black hole.The infalling matter releases...

. Owing to their extraordinarily rapid and stable rotation, MSPs can be used by astronomers as clocks rivaling the stability of the best atomic clocks on Earth. Factors affecting the arrival time of pulses at the Earth by more than a few hundred nanosecond

Nanosecond

A nanosecond is one billionth of a second . One nanosecond is to one second as one second is to 31.7 years.The word nanosecond is formed by the prefix nano and the unit second. Its symbol is ns....

s can be easily detected and used to make precise measurements. Physical parameters accessible through pulsar timing include the 3D position of the pulsar, its proper motion

Proper motion

The proper motion of a star is its angular change in position over time as seen from the center of mass of the solar system. It is measured in seconds of arc per year, arcsec/yr, where 3600 arcseconds equal one degree. This contrasts with radial velocity, which is the time rate of change in...

, the electron

Electron

The electron is a subatomic particle with a negative elementary electric charge. It has no known components or substructure; in other words, it is generally thought to be an elementary particle. An electron has a mass that is approximately 1/1836 that of the proton...

content of the interstellar medium

Interstellar medium

In astronomy, the interstellar medium is the matter that exists in the space between the star systems in a galaxy. This matter includes gas in ionic, atomic, and molecular form, dust, and cosmic rays. It fills interstellar space and blends smoothly into the surrounding intergalactic space...

along the propagation path, the orbital parameters of any binary companion, the pulsar rotation period and its evolution with time. (These are computed from the raw timing data by Tempo

Tempo (astronomy)

Tempo is a software program used to analyze radio observations of pulsars. Once enough observations are available, Tempo can deduce the pulsar rotation rate and phase, astrometric position and rates of change, and parameters of binary systems, by fitting models to pulse times of arrival measured...

, a computer program specialized for this task.) After these factors have been taken into account, deviations between the observed arrival times and predictions made using these parameters can be found and attributed to one of three possibilities: intrinsic variations in the spin period of the pulsar, errors in the realization of Terrestrial Time

Terrestrial Time

Terrestrial Time is a modern astronomical time standard defined by the International Astronomical Union, primarily for time-measurements of astronomical observations made from the surface of the Earth....

against which arrival times were measured, or the presence of background gravitational waves. Scientists are currently attempting to resolve these possibilities by comparing the deviations seen amongst several different pulsars, forming what is known as a Pulsar timing array

Pulsar timing array

A pulsar timing array is a set of millisecond pulsars that can be used to detect and analyse gravitational waves. Such a detection would result from a detailed investigation of the arrival times of pulses emitted by these millisecond pulsars....

. With luck, these efforts may lead to a time scale

Time scale

A time scale specifies divisions of time.*Time standard, a specification of either the rate at which time passes, or points in time, or both*Duration , a quantity of time...

a factor of ten or better than currently available, and the first ever direct detection of gravitational waves.
In June 2006, the astronomer John Middleditch and his team at LANL announced the first prediction of pulsar glitches

Glitch (astronomy)

A glitch is a sudden increase in the rotational frequency of a rotation-powered pulsar, which usually decreases steadily due to braking provided by the emission of radiation and high-energy particles. It is unknown whether or not they are related to the timing noise which all pulsars exhibit...

with observational data from the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer

Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer

The Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer is a satellite that observes the time structure of astronomical X-ray sources. The RXTE has three instruments—the Proportional Counter Array, the High-Energy X-ray Timing Experiment , and one instrument called the All Sky Monitor...

. They used observations of the pulsar PSR J0537-6910

PSR J0537-6910

|- style="vertical-align: top;"| Distance | 170.000 LyPSR J0537-6910 is a pulsar that is 4,000 years old , and 170,000 light years away, in the southern sky...

.

In 1992, Aleksander Wolszczan

Aleksander Wolszczan

Aleksander Wolszczan is a Polish astronomer. He is the co-discoverer of the first extrasolar planets and pulsar planets.- Scientific career :...

discovered the first extrasolar planets around PSR B1257+12

PSR B1257+12

PSR B1257+12, sometimes abbreviated as PSR 1257+12, is a pulsar located roughly 2000 light-years from the Sun. In 2007, it was confirmed that three extrasolar planets orbit the pulsar.- Pulsar :...

. This discovery presented important evidence concerning the widespread existence of planets outside the solar system

Solar System

The Solar System consists of the Sun and the astronomical objects gravitationally bound in orbit around it, all of which formed from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud approximately 4.6 billion years ago. The vast majority of the system's mass is in the Sun...

, although it is very unlikely that any life form

Organism

In biology, an organism is any contiguous living system . In at least some form, all organisms are capable of response to stimuli, reproduction, growth and development, and maintenance of homoeostasis as a stable whole.An organism may either be unicellular or, as in the case of humans, comprise...

could survive in the environment of intense radiation near a pulsar.

Nomenclature

Initially pulsars were named with letters of the discovering observatory followed by their right ascension

Right ascension

Right ascension is the astronomical term for one of the two coordinates of a point on the celestial sphere when using the equatorial coordinate system. The other coordinate is the declination.-Explanation:...

(e.g. CP 1919). As more pulsars were discovered, the letter code became unwieldy and so the convention was then superseded by the letters PSR (Pulsating Source of Radio) followed by the pulsar's right ascension and degrees of declination

Declination

In astronomy, declination is one of the two coordinates of the equatorial coordinate system, the other being either right ascension or hour angle. Declination in astronomy is comparable to geographic latitude, but projected onto the celestial sphere. Declination is measured in degrees north and...

(e.g. PSR 0531+21) and sometimes declination to a tenth of a degree (e.g. PSR 1913+167). Pulsars that are very close together sometimes have letters appended (e.g. PSR 0021-72C and PSR 0021-72D).

The modern convention is to prefix the older numbers with a B (e.g. PSR B1919+21) with the B meaning the coordinates are for the 1950.0 epoch. All new pulsars have a J indicating 2000.0 coordinates and also have declination including minutes (e.g. PSR J1921+2153). Pulsars that were discovered before 1993 tend to retain their B names rather than use their J names (e.g. PSR J1921+2153 is more commonly known as PSR B1919+21). Recently discovered pulsars only have a J name (e.g. PSR J0437-4715

PSR J0437-4715

PSR J0437-4715 is a pulsar. Discovered in the Parkes 70 cm survey, it remains the closest and brightest millisecond pulsar known. The pulsar rotates about its axis 173.7 times per second and therefore completes a rotation every 5.75 milliseconds. It emits a searchlight-like radio beam that...

). All pulsars have a J name that provides more precise coordinates of its location in the sky.

Applications

The study of pulsars has resulted in many applications in physics and astronomy. Striking examples include the confirmation of the existence of gravitational radiation as predicted by general relativity

General relativity

General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

and the first detection of an extrasolar planetary system.

The discovery of pulsars allowed astronomers to study an object never observed before, the neutron star

Neutron star

. This kind of object is the only place where the behavior of matter at nuclear

Atomic nucleus

The nucleus is the very dense region consisting of protons and neutrons at the center of an atom. It was discovered in 1911, as a result of Ernest Rutherford's interpretation of the famous 1909 Rutherford experiment performed by Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden, under the direction of Rutherford. The...

density can be observed (though not directly). Also, millisecond pulsars have allowed a test of general relativity

General relativity

General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

in conditions of an intense gravitational field.

Pulsar maps have been included on the two Pioneer Plaque

Pioneer plaque

The Pioneer plaques are a pair of gold-anodized aluminium plaques which were placed on board the 1972 Pioneer 10 and 1973 Pioneer 11 spacecraft, featuring a pictorial message, in case either Pioneer 10 or 11 are intercepted by extraterrestrial life...

s as well as the Voyager Golden Record

Voyager Golden Record

The Voyager Golden Records are phonograph records which were included aboard both Voyager spacecraft, which were launched in 1977. They contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth, and are intended for any intelligent extraterrestrial life form, or for...

. They show the position of the Sun

Sun

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

, relative to 14 pulsars, which are identified by the unique timing of their electromagnetic pulses, so that our position both in space and in time can be calculated by potential extraterrestrial

Extraterrestrial life

Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...

intelligences. Because pulsars are emitting very regular pulses of radio waves, its radio transmissions do not require daily corrections. Moreover, pulsar positioning could create a spacecraft navigation system independently, or be an auxiliary device to GPS instruments.

As probes of the interstellar medium

The radiation from pulsars passes through the interstellar medium

Interstellar medium

(ISM) before reaching Earth. Free electron

Electron

s in the warm (8000 K), ionized component of the ISM and H II region

H II region

An H II region is a large, low-density cloud of partially ionized gas in which star formation has recently taken place. The short-lived, blue stars forged in these regions emit copious amounts of ultraviolet light, ionizing the surrounding gas...

s affect the radiation in two primary ways. The resulting changes to the pulsar's radiation provide an important probe of the ISM itself.

Because of the dispersive

Dispersion (optics)

In optics, dispersion is the phenomenon in which the phase velocity of a wave depends on its frequency, or alternatively when the group velocity depends on the frequency.Media having such a property are termed dispersive media...

nature of the interstellar plasma

Plasma (physics)

In physics and chemistry, plasma is a state of matter similar to gas in which a certain portion of the particles are ionized. Heating a gas may ionize its molecules or atoms , thus turning it into a plasma, which contains charged particles: positive ions and negative electrons or ions...

, lower-frequency radio waves travel through the medium slower than higher-frequency radio waves. The resulting delay in the arrival of pulses at a range of frequencies is directly measurable as the dispersion measure of the pulsar. The dispersion measure is the total column density of free electrons between the observer and the pulsar,

where

is the distance from the pulsar to the observer and

is the electron density of the ISM. The dispersion measure is used to construct models of the free electron distribution in the Milky Way Galaxy.

Additionally, turbulence

Turbulence

In fluid dynamics, turbulence or turbulent flow is a flow regime characterized by chaotic and stochastic property changes. This includes low momentum diffusion, high momentum convection, and rapid variation of pressure and velocity in space and time...

in the interstellar gas causes density inhomogeneities in the ISM which cause scattering

Scattering

Scattering is a general physical process where some forms of radiation, such as light, sound, or moving particles, are forced to deviate from a straight trajectory by one or more localized non-uniformities in the medium through which they pass. In conventional use, this also includes deviation of...

of the radio waves from the pulsar. The resulting scintillation

Scintillation (astronomy)

Scintillation or twinkling are generic terms for rapid variations in apparent brightness or color of a distant luminous object viewed through a medium, most commonly the atmosphere ....

of the radio waves—the same effect as the twinkling of a star in visible light due to density variations in the Earth's atmosphere—can be used to reconstruct information about the small scale variations in the ISM. Due to the high velocity (up to several hundred km/s) of many pulsars, a single pulsar scans the ISM rapidly, which results in changing scintillation patterns over timescales of a few minutes.

As probes of space-time

Pulsars orbiting within the curved space-time around Sgr A*, the supermassive black hole

Supermassive black hole

A supermassive black hole is the largest type of black hole in a galaxy, in the order of hundreds of thousands to billions of solar masses. Most, and possibly all galaxies, including the Milky Way, are believed to contain supermassive black holes at their centers.Supermassive black holes have...

at the center of the Milky Way galaxy, could serve as probes of gravity in the strong-field regime. Arrival times of the pulses would be affected by special

Special relativity

Special relativity is the physical theory of measurement in an inertial frame of reference proposed in 1905 by Albert Einstein in the paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies".It generalizes Galileo's...

- and general-relativistic

General relativity

General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

Doppler shifts and by the complicated paths that the radio waves would travel through the strongly curved space-time around the black hole. In order for the effects of general relativity

General relativity

General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...

to be measurable with current instruments, pulsars with orbital periods less than about 10 years would need to be discovered; such pulsars would orbit at distances inside 0.01 pc from Sgr A*. Searches are currently underway; at present, five pulsars are known to lie within 100 pc from Sgr A*.

Significant pulsars

The first radio pulsar CP 1919 (now known as PSR 1919+21
PSR 1919+21
|-! style="background-color: #FFFFC0;" colspan="2" | Astrometry|- style="vertical-align: top;"| Spectral type | Pulsar|- style="vertical-align: top;"| Apparent magnitude ||- style="vertical-align: top;"| Distance | 2283.12 Ly...

), with a pulse period of 1.337 seconds and a pulse width of 0.04 second, was discovered in 1967. A drawing of this pulsar's radio waves was used as the cover of British post-punk
Post-punk
Post-punk is a rock music movement with its roots in the late 1970s, following on the heels of the initial punk rock explosion of the mid-1970s. The genre retains its roots in the punk movement but is more introverted, complex and experimental...

band Joy Division
Joy Division
Joy Division were an English rock band formed in 1976 in Salford, Greater Manchester. Originally named Warsaw, the band primarily consisted of Ian Curtis , Bernard Sumner , Peter Hook and Stephen Morris .Joy Division rapidly evolved from their initial punk rock influences...

's debut album, Unknown Pleasures
Unknown Pleasures
Unknown Pleasures is the debut album by the English post-punk band Joy Division, released in 1979 through Factory Records. Martin Hannett produced the record at Strawberry Studios, Stockport, England. The album sold poorly upon release, but due to the subsequent success of Joy Division with the...

.
The first binary pulsar
Binary pulsar
A binary pulsar is a pulsar with a binary companion, often a white dwarf or neutron star. Binary pulsars are one of the few objects which allow physicists to test general relativity in the case of a strong gravitational field...

, PSR 1913+16
PSR 1913+16
PSR B1913+16 is a pulsar which together with another neutron star is in orbit around a common center of mass, thus forming a binary star system. In 1974 it was discovered by Russell Alan Hulse and Joseph Hooton Taylor, Jr., of Princeton University...

, whose orbit is decaying at the exact rate predicted due to the emission of gravitational radiation by general relativity
General relativity
General relativity or the general theory of relativity is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1916. It is the current description of gravitation in modern physics...
The first millisecond pulsar, PSR B1937+21
PSR B1937+21
PSR B1937+21 is a pulsar located in the constellation Vulpecula a few degrees in the sky away from the first discovered pulsar, PSR B1919+21. The name PSR B1937+21 is derived from the word "pulsar" and the declination and right ascension at which it is located, with the "B" indicating that the...
The brightest millisecond pulsar, PSR J0437-4715
PSR J0437-4715
PSR J0437-4715 is a pulsar. Discovered in the Parkes 70 cm survey, it remains the closest and brightest millisecond pulsar known. The pulsar rotates about its axis 173.7 times per second and therefore completes a rotation every 5.75 milliseconds. It emits a searchlight-like radio beam that...
The first X-ray pulsar, Cen X-3
The first accreting millisecond X-ray pulsar, SAX J1808.4-3658
SAX J1808.4-3658
A transient X-ray source first discovered in 1996 by the Italian-Dutch BeppoSAX satellite, SAX J1808.4-3658 revealed X-ray pulsations at the 401 Hz neutron star spin frequency when it was observed during a subsequent outburst in 1998 by NASA's RXTE satellite. The neutron star orbits a brown dwarf...
The first pulsar with planets, PSR B1257+12
PSR B1257+12
PSR B1257+12, sometimes abbreviated as PSR 1257+12, is a pulsar located roughly 2000 light-years from the Sun. In 2007, it was confirmed that three extrasolar planets orbit the pulsar.- Pulsar :...
The first double pulsar binary system, PSR J0737−3039
PSR J0737-3039
|- style="vertical-align: top;"| Distance | 1600 - 2000 Ly PSR J0737-3039 is currently the only known double pulsar, it consists of two neutron stars emitting electromagnetic waves in the radio wavelength in a relativistic binary system. The two Pulsars are known as PSR J0737-3039A and PSR...
The longest period pulsar, PSR J2144-3933
PSR J2144-3933
|- style="vertical-align: top;"| Distance | 587.088 Ly PSR J2144-3933 is a pulsar about 180 parsecs from Earth...
The most stable pulsar in period, PSR J0437-4715
PSR J0437-4715
PSR J0437-4715 is a pulsar. Discovered in the Parkes 70 cm survey, it remains the closest and brightest millisecond pulsar known. The pulsar rotates about its axis 173.7 times per second and therefore completes a rotation every 5.75 milliseconds. It emits a searchlight-like radio beam that...
The magnetar SGR 1806-20
SGR 1806-20
|- style="vertical-align: top;"| Distance | 50,000 light-years SGR 1806-20 is a magnetar, a particular type of neutron star. It has been identified as a soft gamma repeater. SGR 1806-20 is located about 14.5 kiloparsecs from Earth on the far side of our Milky Way galaxy in the constellation of...

produced the largest burst of power in the Galaxy ever experimentally recorded on 27 December 2004

PSR B1931+24 "... appears as a normal pulsar for about a week and then 'switches off' for about one month before emitting pulses again. [..] this pulsar slows down more rapidly when the pulsar is on than when it is off. [.. the] braking mechanism must be related to the radio emission and the processes creating it and the additional slow-down can be explained by the pulsar wind leaving the pulsar's magnetosphere and carrying away rotational energy."

PSR J1748-2446ad, at 716 Hz, the pulsar with the highest rotation speed.

PSR J1903+0327
PSR J1903+0327
PSR J1903+0327 is a millisecond pulsar in a highly eccentric binary orbit.The pulsar was discovered in an ongoing L-band survey with the 305 m diameter Arecibo radio telescope....

, a ~2.15 ms pulsar discovered to be in a highly eccentric binary star
Binary star
A binary star is a star system consisting of two stars orbiting around their common center of mass. The brighter star is called the primary and the other is its companion star, comes, or secondary...

system with a sun-like star.

A pulsar in the CTA 1 supernova
Supernova
A supernova is a stellar explosion that is more energetic than a nova. It is pronounced with the plural supernovae or supernovas. Supernovae are extremely luminous and cause a burst of radiation that often briefly outshines an entire galaxy, before fading from view over several weeks or months...

remnant (4U 0000+72, in Cassiopeia
Cassiopeia (constellation)
Cassiopeia is a constellation in the northern sky, named after the vain queen Cassiopeia in Greek mythology, who boasted about her unrivalled beauty. Cassiopea was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd century Greek astronomer Ptolemy, and it remains one of the 88 modern constellations today...

) was found by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope to emit pulsations only in gamma ray radiation, the first recorded of its kind.

PSR J2007+2722
PSR J2007+2722
PSR J2007+2722 is a 40.8-hertz isolated pulsar in the Vulpecula constellation, 5.3 kpc distant in the plane of the Galaxy, and is most likely a Disrupted Recycled Pulsar ....

, a 40.8-hertz 'recycled' isolated pulsar was found on data taken in February 2007, and analyzed by distributed computing
Distributed computing
Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...

project Einstein@Home
Einstein@Home
Einstein@Home is a volunteer distributed computing project hosted by the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee and the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics . The project is directed by Bruce Allen...

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External links

"Pinning Down a Pulsar’s Age". Science News.
"Astronomical whirling dervishes hide their age well". Astronomy Now.
Animation of a Pulsar. Einstein.com, 17 January 2008.
"The Discovery of Pulsars." BBC, 23 December 2002.
"A Pulsar Discovery: First Optical Pulsar." Moments of Discovery, American Institute of Physics, 2007 (Includes audio and teachers guides).
Discovery of Pulsars: Interview with Jocelyn Bell-Burnell. Jodcast, June 2007 (Low Quality Version).
Audio: Cain/Gay - Astronomy Cast. Pulsars - Nov 2009
Listing for PULS CP 1919 (The First Pulsar), Simbad Database
Australia National Telescope Facility: Pulsar Catalogue
Johnston, William Robert. "List of Pulsars in Binary Systems." Johnston Archive, 22 March 2005.
Staff Writers. "Scientists Can Predict Pulsar Starquakes." Space Daily, 7 June 2006.
Staff Writers. "XMM-Newton Makes New Discoveries About Old Pulsars." Space Daily, 27 July 2006.
Than, Ker. "Hot New Idea: How Dead Stars Go Cold." Space.com, 27 July 2006.
"New Kind of Pulsar Discovered"http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/2260/new-kind-pulsar-discovered. Cosmos Online.
Artist's Rendition of Pulsar. Digital Blasphemy.

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Formation

Discovery

Subsequent history

Categories

Disrupted recycled pulsar

Nomenclature

Applications

As probes of the interstellar medium

As probes of space-time

Significant pulsars

See also

External links