Gamma-ray and X-ray luminosities from spin-powered pulsars in the full polar cap cascade model

Abstract

We modify the conventional curvature radiation (inverse Compton scattering) + synchrotron radiation polar cap cascade model by including the inverse Compton scattering of the higher generation pairs. Within the framework of the space-charge-limited-flow acceleration model with frame-dragging proposed by Harding & Muslimov (1998), such a full polar cap cascade scenario can well reproduce the $L_{\gamma }\propto (L_{\mathrm{sd}}{)}^{1/2}$ and the $L_x\sim 10^{-3}{L}_{\mathrm{sd}}$ dependences observed from the known spin-powered pulsars. According to this model, the ``pulsed'' soft ROSAT-band X-rays from most of the millisecond pulsars might be of thermal origin, if there are no strong multipole magnetic components near their surfaces.

arXiv commentTo appear in Proc. 5th Compton Symposium, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, concise version of the ApJ paper