Optical Observations of PSR J0205+6449 - the next optical pulsar?

Abstract

PSR J0205+6449 is a young ({\approx} 5400 years), Crab-like pulsar detected in radio and at X and γ-ray energies and has the third largest spin-down flux among known rotation powered pulsars. It also powers a bright synchrotron nebula detected in the optical and X-rays. At a distance of {\approx} 3.2 kpc and with an extinction comparable to the Crab, PSR J0205+6449 is an obvious target for optical observations. We observed PSR J0205+6449 with several optical facilities, including 8m class ground-based telescopes, such as the Gemini and the Gran Telescopio Canarias. We detected a point source, at a significance of 5.5σ, of magnitude i {\approx} 25.5, at the centre of the optical synchrotron nebula, coincident with the very accurate Chandra and radio positions of the pulsar. Thus, we discovered a candidate optical counterpart to PSR J0205+6449. The pulsar candidate counterpart is also detected in the g ({\approx}27.4) band and weakly in the r ({\approx}26.2) band. Its optical spectrum is fit by a power law with photon index Γ0 = 1.9{\pm}0.5, proving that the optical emission if of non-thermal origin, is as expected for a young pulsar. The optical photon index is similar to the X-ray one (ΓX = 1.77{\pm}0.03), although the optical fluxes are below the extrapolation of the X-ray power spectrum. This would indicate the presence of a double spectral break between the X-ray and optical energy range, at variance with what is observed for the Crab and Vela pulsars, but similar to the Large Magellanic Cloud pulsar PSR B0540-69.

13 Pages, 4 Tables, 7 Figures, Accepted for publication in MNRAS

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• The ATNF Pulsar Catalogue
• Pulsar Timing for the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope
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• Optical Polarimetry of the Inner Crab Nebula and Pulsar
• The Infrared Detection of the Pulsar Wind Nebula in the Galactic Supernova Remnant 3C 58
• Discovery of Pulsations from the Pulsar J0205+6449 in SNR 3C 58 with the Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope
• A Shell of Thermal X-ray Emission Associated with the Young Crab-like Remnant 3C58
• A possible optical counterpart to the old nearby pulsar J0108-1431
• Optical identification of the 3C 58 pulsar wind nebula
• Calibration of photometry from the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph on Gemini North
• HST multi-epoch imaging of the PSR B0540-69 system unveils a highly dynamic synchrotron nebula
• The X-ray behaviour of Fermi/LAT pulsars
• A likely optical counterpart of the G292.0+1.8 pulsar wind nebula
• Optical Observations of PSR J0205+6449

Cited by in corpus (8)

• Optical pulsations from a transitional millisecond pulsar
• Stellar Binaries That Survive Supernovae
• The first ultraviolet detection of the Large Magellanic Cloud pulsar PSR B0540-69 and its multi-wavelength properties
• Observations of three young gamma-ray pulsars with the Gran Telescopio Canarias
• A candidate optical counterpart to the middle-aged gamma-ray pulsar PSR J1741-2054
• A polarized view of the young Pulsar Wind Nebula 3C 58 with IXPE
• Observations of one young and three middle-aged $\gamma$-ray pulsars with the Gran Telescopio Canarias
• Searching for the optical counterparts of two young gamma-ray pulsars