The Coughing Pulsar Magnetosphere
Abstract
Polar magnetospheric gaps consume a fraction of the electric potential that develops accross open field lines. This effect modifies significantly the structure of the axisymmetric pulsar magnetosphere. We present numerical stead-state solutions for various values of the gap potential. We show that a charge starved magnetosphere contains significantly less electric current than one with freely available electric charges. As a result, electromagnetic neutron star braking becomes inefficient. We argue that the magnetosphere may spontaneously rearrange itself to a lower energy configuration through a dramatic release of electromagnetic field energy and magentic flux. Our results might be relevant in understanding the recent December 27, 2004 burst observed in SGR 1806-20.
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0507201,
title = {The Coughing Pulsar Magnetosphere},
author = {Ioannis Contopoulos},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0507201},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
8 pages, 8 figures