Related papers: Pulsar Magnetospheres and Pulsar Winds
Pulsars are remarkably precise "celestial clocks" that can be used to explore many different aspects of physics and astrophysics. In this article I give a brief summary of pulsar properties and describe some of the applications of pulsar…
The number of pulsars with detected emission at X-ray and gamma-ray energies has been steadily growing, showing that beams of high-energy particles are commonly accelerated in pulsar magnetospheres, even though the location and number of…
Pulsars are rotating neutron stars which emit lighthouse-like beams. Owing to their unique properties, pulsars are a unique astrophysical tool to test general relativity, inform on matter at extreme densities, and probe galactic magnetic…
A fully general relativistic description of the pulsar magnetosphere is provided. To be more concrete, a study of the pulsar magnetosphere is performed in the context of general relativistic magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) employing the…
Pulsar winds have been shown to be preferred sites of particle acceleration and high-energy radiation. Numerous studies have been conducted to better characterize the general structure of such relativistic plasmas in isolated systems.…
Fast magnetosonic waves in a magnetically-dominated plasma are investigated. In the pulsar wind, these waves may transport a significant fraction of the energy flux. It is shown that the nonlinear steepening and subsequent formation of…
Interactions between the winds of stars and the magnetospheres and atmospheres of planets involve many processes, including the acceleration of particles, heating of upper atmospheres, and a diverse range of atmospheric loss processes.…
We apply a computationally efficient technique to validate the global structure of the pulsar magnetosphere. In this first of a series of studies, a 3D, computationally intensive, implicit Crank-Nicolson finite-difference scheme is…
Particles are accelerated to very high, non-thermal energies during explosive energy-release phenomena in space, solar, and astrophysical plasma environments. While it has been established that magnetic reconnection plays an important role…
Pulsar wind nebulae are fascinating systems, and archetypal sources for high-energy astrophysics in general. Due to their vicinity, brightness, to the fact that they shine at multi-wavelengths, and especially to their long-living emission…
About two years ago, Wolszczan and Frail announced the detection of a possible planetary system consisting of two Earth-mass planets around a millisecond pulsar. It was pointed out shortly thereafter that the mutual gravitational…
Young pulsars spin incredibly quickly, but are also slowing down at a very rapid rate. This process carries away enormous amounts of energy from the star in the form of a relativistic wind. Through the high resolution now offered by the…
I give a brief overview of recent results from self-consistent modeling of electron-positrons cascades in pulsar polar caps. These results strongly suggest that the pulsar magnetosphere is a more complex system than was assumed before.
Pulsars are famed for their rotational clock-like stability and their highly-repeatable pulse shapes. However, it has long been known that there are unexplained deviations (often termed "timing noise") from the rate at which we predict…
We present a statistical study of pulsars and millisecond pulsars (MSPs) based on multiwavelength observations in the Galactic Field and Globular Clusters. We examine their emission properties, timing behavior, and spatial distributions,…
Pulsar Wind Nebulae (PWNe) are ideal astrophysical laboratories where high energy relativistic phenomena can be investigated. They are close, well resolved in our observations, and the knowledge derived in their study has a strong impact in…
We present initial results of the first self-consistent numerical model of the outer magnetosphere of a pulsar. By using the relativistic ``particle-in-cell'' method with special boundary conditions to represent plasma dynamics in 3D, we…
In this contribution we review the recent progress in the modeling of Pulsar Wind Nebulae (PWN). We start with a brief overview of the relevant physical processes in the magnetosphere, the wind-zone and the inflated nebula bubble. Radiative…
I review the theoretical understanding of the global structure of pulsar magnetospheres concentrating on recent progress in force-free electrodynamics and first-principles simulations of magnetospheres.
The global structure of the current flows in pulsar magnetospheres is investigated, with rough calculations of the elements in the magnetospheric circuit. It is emphasized that the potential of critical field lines is the same as that of…