Related papers: Observing Radio Pulsars in the Galactic Centre wit…
We propose to use pulsar scintillation measurements to test predictions of alternative theories of gravity. Comparing to single-path pulsar timing measurements, the scintillation measurements can achieve a factor of 10^5 improvement in…
Recent measurements of stellar orbits provide compelling evidence that the compact radio source Sagittarius A* at the Galactic Centre is a 3.6-million-solar-mass black hole. Sgr A* is remarkably faint in all wavebands other than the radio…
The advent of next generation radio telescope facilities, such as the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), will usher in an era where a Pulsar Timing Array (PTA) based search for gravitational waves (GWs) will be able to use hundreds of well timed…
Pulsars in close binary orbit around another neutron star or a massive white dwarf make ideal laboratories for testing the predictions of gravitational radiation and self-gravitational effects. We report new timing measurements of the…
A forefront area of research concerns the exploration of the properties of hadronic matter under extreme conditions of temperature and density, and the determination of the equation of state--the relation between pressure, temperature and…
Studying the orbital motion of stars around Sagittarius A* in the Galactic Center provides a unique opportunity to probe the gravitational potential near the supermassive black hole at the heart of our Galaxy. Interferometric data obtained…
The Square Kilometre Array will be an amazing instrument for pulsar astronomy. While the full SKA will be sensitive enough to detect all pulsars in the Galaxy visible from Earth, already with SKA1, pulsar searches will discover enough…
Binaries consisting of a pulsar and a black hole (BH) are a holy grail of astrophysics, both for their significance for stellar evolution and for their potential application as probes of strong gravity. In spite of extensive surveys of our…
High-precision pulsar timing is central to a wide range of astrophysics and fundamental physics applications. When timing an ensemble of millisecond pulsars in different sky positions, known as a pulsar timing array (PTA), one can search…
We summarize the state of the art and future directions in using millisecond radio pulsars to test gravitation and measure intrinsic, fundamental parameters of the pulsar systems. As discussed below, such measurements continue to yield…
Stars orbiting within 1$\arcsec$ of the supermassive black hole in the Galactic Centre, Sgr A*, are notoriously difficult to detect due to obscuration by gas and dust. We show that some stars orbiting this region may be detectable via…
We investigate the capability of pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) as a probe of primordial black holes (PBHs), which might constitute the Galactic dark matter. A PBH passing nearby the Earth or a pulsar gives an impulse acceleration and induces…
The observed rotation measures (RMs) towards the galactic centre magnetar and towards Sagittarius A* provide a strong constraint on MHD models of the galactic centre accretion flow, probing distances from the black hole separated by many…
We report measurements with the Very Long Baseline Array of the proper motion of Sgr A* relative to two extragalactic radio sources spanning 18 years. The apparent motion of Sgr A* is -6.411 +/- 0.008 mas/yr along the Galactic plane and…
The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) is an integral part of the next-generation observatories that will survey the Universe across the electromagnetic spectrum, and beyond, revolutionizing our view of fundamental physics, astrophysics and…
Proper motions and radial velocities of luminous infrared stars in the galactic center have provided strong evidence for a dark mass of 2.5 million solar masses in the central 0.05 pc of the galaxy. The leading hypothesis for this mass is a…
Empirically determining the averaged variations of the orbital parameters of the stars orbiting the Supermassive Black Hole (SBH) hosted by the Galactic Centre (GC) in Sgr A* is, in principle, a valuable tool to put on the test the General…
The Galactic Center of the Milky Way, thanks to its proximity, allows to perform astronomical observations that investigate physical phenomena at the edge of astrophysics and fundamental physics. As such, it offers a unique laboratory to…
The ionised media that permeate the Milky Way have been active topics of research since the discovery of pulsars in 1967. In fact, pulsars allow one to study several aspects of said plasma, such as their column density, turbulence,…
Detecting and studying pulsars above a few GHz in the radio band is challenging due to the typical faintness of pulsar radio emission, their steep spectra, and the lack of observatories with sufficient sensitivity operating at high…