Fast as Potoroo: Radio Continuum Detection of a Bow-Shock Pulsar Wind Nebula Powered by Pulsar J1638-4713

Abstract

We report the discovery of a bow-shock pulsar wind nebula (PWN), named Potoroo, and the detection of a young pulsar J1638-4713 that powers the nebula. We present a radio continuum study of the PWN based on 20-cm observations obtained from the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) and MeerKAT. PSR J1638-4713 was identified using Parkes radio telescope observations at frequencies above 3 GHz. The pulsar has the second-highest dispersion measure of all known radio pulsars (1553 pc/cm^3), a spin period of 65.74 ms and a spin-down luminosity of 6.1x10^36 erg/s. The PWN has a cometary morphology and one of the greatest projected lengths among all the observed pulsar radio tails, measuring over 21 pc for an assumed distance of 10 kpc. The remarkably long tail and atypically steep radio spectral index are attributed to the interplay of a supernova reverse shock and the PWN. The originating supernova remnant is not known so far. We estimated the pulsar kick velocity to be in the range of 1000-2000 km/s for ages between 23 and 10 kyr. The X-ray counterpart found in Chandra data, CXOU J163802.6-471358, shows the same tail morphology as the radio source but is shorter by a factor of 10. The peak of the X-ray emission is offset from the peak of the radio total intensity (Stokes I) emission by approximately 4.7", but coincides well with circularly polarised (Stokes V) emission. No infrared counterpart was found.

16 pages, 8 figures, 4 tables; Accepted for publication in PASA on 18 Jan 2024

References in corpus (24)

• TEMPO2, a new pulsar timing package. I: Overview
• A New Electron Density Model for Estimation of Pulsar and FRB Distances
• PSRCHIVE and PSRFITS An Open Approach to Radio Pulsar Data Storage and Analysis
• The Molonglo Galactic Plane Survey (MGPS-2): Compact Source Catalogue
• Pulsar Wind Nebulae in the Chandra Era
• Pulsar Wind Nebulae Created by Fast-Moving Pulsars
• The distance and neutral environment of the massive stellar cluster Westerlund 1
• Pulsar-wind nebulae and magnetar outflows: observations at radio, X-ray, and gamma-ray wavelengths
• A global view on star formation: The GLOSTAR Galactic Plane Survey. I. Overview and first results for the Galactic longitude range 28° < l < 36°
• Wideband polarized radio emission from the newly revived magnetar XTE J1810$-$197
• X-ray emission properties of the old pulsar PSR B2224+65
• Updated radio $\Sigma -D$ relation for Galactic supernova remnants
• Modelling Jets, Tori and Flares in Pulsar Wind Nebulae
• A Catalogue of Radio Supernova Remnants and Candidate Supernova Remnants in the EMU/POSSUM Galactic Pilot Field
• Discovery of a Pulsar-powered Bow Shock Nebula in the Small Magellanic Cloud Supernova Remnant DEMS5
• A Statistical Study of Galactic SNRs using the PMN Survey
• A Radio Continuum and Polarisation Study of the pulsar wind nebula CTB87 (G74.9+1.2)
• The Norma Arm Region Chandra Survey: X-ray Populations in the Spiral Arms
• A NuSTAR and Chandra Investigation of the Misaligned Outflow of PSR J1101-6101 and the Lighthouse Pulsar Wind Nebula
• A Quarter Century of Guitar Nebula/Filament Evolution
• Investigating CXOU J163802.6-471358: a new pulsar wind nebula in the Norma region?
• Bow-shock Pulsar Wind Nebulae Passing Through Density Discontinuities
• Detection of strong scattering close to the eclipse region of PSR B1957+20
• High-Resolution Radio Study of the Dragonfly Nebula

Cited by in corpus (2)

• The TRAPUM Small Magellanic Cloud pulsar survey with MeerKAT: I. Discovery of seven new pulsars and two Pulsar Wind Nebula associations
• Ultra-high-energy $\gamma$-ray emission associated with the tail of a bow-shock pulsar wind nebula