Transient Radio Neutron Stars

Abstract

Here I will review the high time resolution radio sky, focusing on millisecond scales. This is primarily occupied by neutron stars, the well-known radio pulsars and the recently identified group of transient sources known as Rotating RAdio Transients (RRATs). The RRATs appear to be abundant in the Galaxy, which at first glance may be difficult to reconcile with the observed supernova rate. However, as I will discuss, it seems that the RRATs can be explained as pulsars which are either extreme nullers, highly variable or weak/distant. I will re-cap some recent results including a re-analysis of the Parkes Multi-beam Pulsar Survey, which has identified several new sources, as well as the unusual timing behaviour of RRAT J1819-1458. This leads to an examination of where RRATs fit within the evolution of neutron stars post-supernova.

16 pages, 5 figures, to be published in the proceedings of High Time Resolution Astrophysics IV - The Era of Extremely Large Telescopes, held on May 5-7, 2010, Agios Nikolaos, Crete, Greece

References in corpus (12)

• A bright millisecond radio burst of extragalactic origin
• The Parkes multibeam pulsar survey: VI. Discovery and timing of 142 pulsars and a Galactic population analysis
• A periodically active pulsar giving insight into magnetospheric physics
• Transient pulsed radio emission from a magnetar
• An Interference Removal Technique for Radio Pulsar Searches
• The population of pulsars with interpulses and the implications for beam evolution
• Discovery of Pulsations and a Possible Spectral Feature in the X-ray Emission from Rotating Radio Transient J1819-1458
• Constraining the Spin-down of the Nearby Isolated Neutron Star RX J2143.0+0654
• Pulsar radiation belts and transient radio emission
• Discovery of extended X-ray emission around the highly magnetic RRAT J1819-1458
• The GBT350 Survey of the Northern Galactic Plane for Radio Pulsars and Transients
• Soft Gamma Repeaters and Anomalous X-ray Pulsars: Magnetar Candidates