Interstellar Scintillation of Three Nearby Pulsars with FAST

Abstract

Interstellar scintillation probes the properties of the ionized interstellar medium as well as the dynamical behavior of pulsars themselves. Using the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope, we obtained hour-long observations of PSRs~J0837+0610, J1136+1551, and J1239+2453. We detected a single scintillation arc in PSRs~J0837+0610 and J1239+2453, and identified three distinct arcs in PSR~J1136+1551. Our analysis reveals that the arc curvature scales with observing frequency as $\eta \propto {\nu }^{-2.0\pm 0.6}$ for PSR J0837+0610, and as $\eta \propto {\nu }^{-1.9\pm 0.6}$ for PSR J1239+2453. For PSR J1136+1551, the two clearest arcs exhibit scaling relations of $\eta \propto {\nu }^{-1.6\pm 0.6}$ and $\eta \propto {\nu }^{-2.0\pm 0.4}$, respectively. However, the frequency dependence of the third arc could not be constrained due to its low signal-to-noise ratio at higher frequencies. Moreover, the corresponding scattering screens are measured at distances ranging from 30 to 420 pc from Earth. However, long-term scintillation monitoring or VLBI observations are needed to reliably measure the scattering screen.

Journal of High Energy Astrophysics (JHEAp), doi:10.1016/j.jheap.2026.100628