Record Details

P885 - Understanding the Remarkable Behaviour of Radio Magnetars

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Title P885 - Understanding the Remarkable Behaviour of Radio Magnetars
 
Subject Astronomical and Space Sciences not elsewhere classified
 
Description Neutron stars are extreme objects, the size of a city but containing the
mass of the Sun. Pulsars are neutron stars with very strong magnetic
fields that rotate rapidly and emit focused beams of radio waves that we
may detect on Earth once with every turn of the star, in light-house-like
fashion. While the typical pulsar has a magnetic field strength at its
surface approximately a million million times stronger than Earth's, a
special and rare (only 23 are known) class of neutron stars has a field up
to another factor of 1000 stronger - these are the "magnetars", the most
magnetic objects known in the Universe. Magnetars shine in ways that
are different from those of ordinary pulsars. For many years, despite
careful searches, no magnetar was seen to shine at radio wavelengths.
The objects of our programme are different - they have been established
to emit radio pulses with every turn of the star, detected using the Parkes
64-metre dish. We are now learning more about the characteristics of
this unusual radiation, and through it about radio-emitting magnetars.
 
Publisher CSIRO
 
Date 2022-09-18
 
Identifier csiro:P885
 
Language eng