English

Submillimeter pulsations from the magnetar XTE J1810-197

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena 2022-02-09 v1 Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics

Abstract

We present the first detection of pulsations from a neutron star in the submillimeter range. The source is the magnetar XTE J1810-197, observed with the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) on 2020 February 27, 2020 July 9 and 2021 May 15. XTE J1810-197 is detected at 353 GHz (λ=0.85\lambda=0.85\,mm) in the three epochs, but not detected in the simultaneously-observed band at 666 GHz (λ=0.45\lambda=0.45\,mm). We measure an averaged flux density at 353 GHz of 6.7±\pm1.0, 4.0±\pm0.6, and 1.3±\pm0.3 mJy and set 3σ\sigma flux density upper limits at 666 GHz of 11.3, 4.7 and 4.3 mJy, at each of the three observing epochs, respectively. Combining close-in-time observations with the Effelsberg 100m and IRAM 30m telescopes covering non-contiguously from 6 to 225 GHz (5.0 cm>λ>>\lambda>1.33 mm), we investigate the spectral shape and frequency range of a potential spectral turn-up predicted by some pulsar radio emission models. The results demonstrate that the beamed radio emission from neutron stars can extend into the submillimeter regime, but are inconclusive on the existence and location of a potential spectral turn-up within the covered frequency range. The observed properties of the submillimeter emission resemble those of the longer wavelengths, and support a coherent mechanism for the production of pulsations at 353 GHz.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2201.07820,
  title  = {Submillimeter pulsations from the magnetar XTE J1810-197},
  author = {Pablo Torne and Graham Bell and Dan Bintley and Gregory Desvignes and David Berry and Jessica T. Dempsey and Paul T. P. Ho and Harriet Parsons and Ralph P. Eatough and Ramesh Karuppusamy and Michael Kramer and Carsten Kramer and Kuo Liu and Gabriel Paubert and Miguel Sanchez-Portal and Karl F. Schuster},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2201.07820},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

14 pages, 2 tables, 5 figures. Accepted for publication in ApJ Letters

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