High Energy Emission from Rotation-Powered Pulsars: Outer-gap vs. Slot-gap Models

Abstract

We explore particle accelerator electrodynamics in the magnetosphere of a rapidly rotating neutron star (NS). We address the importance of a self-consistent treatment of pair production, solving the Poisson equation describing the acceleration electric field, the Boltzmann equations for produced electrons and positrons, and the radiative transfer equation simultaneously. It is demonstrated that the accelerator solution is obtained if we only specify the NS spin period, magnetic dipole moment, magnetic inclination angle with respect to the rotation axis, and the NS surface temperature, and that the solution corresponds to a quantitative extension of previous outer-gap models. We apply the scheme to the Crab pulsar and show that the predicted pulse profiles and phase-resolved spectrum are roughly consistent with observations. Applying the same scheme to the slot-gap model, we show that this alternative model predicts too small photon flux to reproduce observations, because the gap trans-field thickness is significantly restricted by its pair-free condition.

15 pages, 19 figures; submitted to the Open Astronomy Journal

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• The Vela Pulsar: Results from the First Year of Fermi LAT Observations
• Pulsar Pair Cascades in Magnetic Fields with Offset Polar Caps
• Gamma-Ray Light Curves from Pulsar Magnetospheres with Finite Conductivity
• Gamma-ray pulsars: a gold mine
• Prospects for Observations of Pulsars and Pulsar Wind Nebulae with CTA
• The near-infrared detection of PSR B0540-69 and its nebula
• On the Transition from Accretion Powered to Rotation Powered Millisecond Pulsars
• Detections of millisecond pulsars with the Fermi Large Area Telescope
• Pulsar emission in the very-high-energy regime
• Very Fine Time-Resolved Spectral Studies of the Vela Pulsar