(ORDO NEWS) — An international team of astronomers announces the discovery of a rare double neutron stellar millisecond pulsar. The discovered binary pulsar, designated PSR J1325-6253, consists of two neutron stars orbiting each other every 1.8 days. The results of the study are detailed in an article published April 14 on the arXiv website.
The fastest rotating pulsars, with a rotation period of less than 30 milliseconds, are known as millisecond pulsars (MSPs). It is assumed that they are formed in binary systems, when an initially more massive component turns into a neutron star, which then spins up due to the accretion of matter from the secondary star.
Some pulsars consist of two neutron stars (the so-called double neutron star systems – BNS). They are one of the most important classes of objects used to test and understand numerous astrophysical and fundamental physical phenomena, including general relativity in the strong field regime.
To date, only 21 CNS pulsars have been identified, and astronomers led by Rahul Sengar at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia report an addition to this short list of such objects – PSR J1325-6253.
The source was discovered during a re-examination of the results of the study of pulsars, carried out as part of the High Time Resolution Universe South Low Latitude (HTRU-S LowLat) program.
“PSR J1325-6253 was discovered during an accelerated rework of the HTRU-S LowLat survey to search for binary pulsars,” the researchers explained.
The study showed that PSR J1325-6253 is a binary MSP with an orbital period of 28.9 ms and an orbital period of 1.81 days.
Given that the binary has a low but significant orbital eccentricity (0.064), a recyclic nature, and a large total mass (about 2.57 solar masses), astronomers suggest that the companion object is most likely another neutron star with a mass of about 1. 2 solar masses.
According to the study, PSR J1325-6253 has a dispersion size of about 303.3 pc/cm3 and a spin-low luminosity of 78 nonillion erg/s. The characteristic age of this pulsar was 0.94 billion years, and the distance to this object is at least 14,300 light years.
Summing up, the researchers emphasized that the orbital eccentricity of PSR J1325-6253 is the lowest among all known ISP systems in a wide orbit and the second largest after PSR J1946+2052.
They noted that this low eccentricity, together with the relatively wide orbit of PSR J1325-6253, strongly suggests that this MSP is the result of an electron capture supernova explosion.
“The present orbital period of 1.81 days and the low eccentricity for J1325-6253 means that the orbital period before the explosion was likely only marginally shorter,” the authors concluded.
—
Online:
Contact us: [email protected]
Our Standards, Terms of Use: Standard Terms And Conditions.