A white dwarf companion to the relativistic pulsar PSR J1141-6545

Abstract

Pulsars with compact companions in close eccentric orbits are unique laboratories for testing general relativity and alternative theories of gravity. Moreover, they are excellent targets for future gravitational wave experiments like LISA and they are also highly important for understanding the equation of state of super-dense matter and the evolution of massive binaries. Here we report on optical observations of the 1.02 M_sun companion to the pulsar PSR J1141-6545. We detect an optical counterpart with apparent magnitudes V=25.08(11) and R=24.38(14), consistent with the timing position of the pulsar. We demonstrate that our results are in agreement with a white dwarf companion. However the latter is redder than expected and the inferred values are not consistent with the theoretical cooling tracks, preventing us from deriving the exact age. Our results confirm the importance of the PSR J1141-6545 system for gravitational experiments.

5 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS

References in corpus (7)

• The Third US Naval Observatory CCD Astrograph Catalog (UCAC3)
• Generic tests of the existence of the gravitational dipole radiation and the variation of the gravitational constant
• Gravitational-radiation losses from the pulsar-white-dwarf binary PSR J1141-6545
• Distances to Anomalous X-ray Pulsars using Red Clump Stars
• Precision southern hemisphere VLBI pulsar astrometry II: Measurement of seven parallaxes
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• Optical Detection of Two Intermediate Mass Binary Pulsar Companions

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