| Description |
Hot subdwarf stars are core-helium burning stars with thin hydrogen layers. They have masses around half the mass of the sun. Mass transfer with a companion star is required to remove a large fraction of the hydrogen envelope and indeed a large fraction of these objects have a close companion with orbital periods of less than a few days. Most of the companions are low-mass stars or white dwarfs. However, theoretical models predict that about 1% of the hot subdwarf stars should host a neutron star companion. So far no neutron star companion to a hot subdwarf has yet been detected unambiguously whereas six candidates have been identified. These systems seem to have a companion mass which is potentially high enough for a neutron star. Here, we conduct a deep search in four of the candidates to search for the first known neutron star around a hot subdwarf star.
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