Timing, polarimetry and physics of the bright, nearby millisecond pulsar PSR J0437-4715 - a single-pulse perspective
Abstract
Single pulses from radio pulsars contain a wealth of information about emission and propagation in the magnetosphere and insight into their timing properties. It was recently demonstrated that single-pulse emission is responsible for limiting the timing stability of the brightest of millisecond pulsars. We report on an analysis of more than a million single pulses from PSR J0437-4715 and present various statistical properties such as the signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) distribution, timing and polarimetry of average profiles integrated from sub-pulses with chosen S/N cut-offs, modulation properties of the emission, phase-resolved statistics of the S/N and two-dimensional spherical histograms of the polarization vector orientation. The last of these indicates the presence of orthogonally polarized modes (OPMs). Combined with the dependence of the polarization fraction on the S/N and polarimetry of the brightest pulses, the existence of OPMs constrains pulsar emission mechanisms and models for the plasma physics in the magnetosphere.
- Publication:
-
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Pub Date:
- July 2014
- DOI:
- 10.1093/mnras/stu804
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1405.2638
- Bibcode:
- 2014MNRAS.441.3148O
- Keywords:
-
- pulsars: general;
- pulsars: individual (PSR J0437-4715);
- Astrophysics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics;
- Astrophysics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena
- E-Print:
- MNRAS, in press. 14 pages, 14 figures. Please note that figures 12, 13 and 14 are low resolution versions due to arxiv's size restrictions. To obtain a full resolution version please see the journal version or contact the first author