Related papers: Pair production in the millisecond pulsar J0030+04…
I present an analysis of the XMM-Newton observations of four millisecond pulsars, J0437-4715, J2124-3358, J1024-0719, and J0034-0534. The new data provide strong evidence of thermal emission in the X-ray flux detected from the first three…
In our contribution we give a brief overview of two widely discussed quantum processes: electron-positron pairs production off a probe photon propagating through a polarized short-pulsed electromagnetic (e.m.) (e.g.\ laser) wave field or…
Observations by the Fermi Large Area Telescope of gamma-ray millisecond pulsar light curves imply copious pair production in their magnetospheres, and not exclusively in those of younger pulsars. Such pair cascades may be a primary source…
(shortened) We report the results of an investigation of particle acceleration and electron-positron plasma generation at low altitude in the polar magnetic flux tubes of Rotation Powered Pulsars, when the stellar surface is free to emit…
It is shown how pair production itself would almost certainly prevent the astrophysical formation of macroscopic dyadospheres, hypothetical regions, extending many electron Compton wavelengths in all directions, where the electric field…
Time-dependent cascades of electron-positron pairs are thought to be the main source of plasma in pulsar magnetospheres and a primary ingredient to explain the nature of pulsar radio emission, a longstanding open problem in high-energy…
Prolific electron-positron pair production is possible at laser intensities approaching 10^{24} W/cm^2 at a wavelength of 1 micron. An analysis of electron trajectories and interactions at the nodes (B=0) of two counter-propagating,…
Via a combination of analytical and numerical methods, we study electron-positron pair creation by the electromagnetic field ${\bf A}(t,{\bf r})=[f(ct-x)+f(ct+x)]{\bf e}_y$ of two colliding laser pulses. Employing a generalized WKB…
Evidence derived with minimal assumptions from existing published observations is presented to show that an ion-proton plasma is the source of radio-frequency emission in millisecond and in normal isolated pulsars. There is no primary…
The linear Breit-Wheeler (LBW) process, mediated by photon-photon collisions, can emerge as the dominant pair production mechanism in the ultraintense laser-plasma interaction for laser intensities below $10^{23}~\rm W/cm^2$. Here, we…
With increasing temperatures, Schwinger pair production changes from a quantum tunnelling to a classical, thermal process, determined by a worldline sphaleron. We show this and calculate the corresponding rate of pair production for both…
Magnetic pair creation $\gamma \to e^+e^-$ has been at the core of radio pulsar paradigms and central to polar cap models of gamma-ray pulsars for over three decades. The Fermi gamma-ray pulsar population now exceeds 140 sources and has…
The discovery of millisecond pulsars switching between states powered either by the rotation of their magnetic field or by the accretion of matter, has recently proved the tight link shared by millisecond radio pulsars and neutron stars in…
Low mass particles with small electric charges can be produced abundantly in large electric fields via the Schwinger effect. We study the production rate of such particles inside the polar gap of nearby pulsars. After production they are…
There is good evidence that electron-positron pair formation is not present in that section of the pulsar open magnetosphere which is the source of coherent radio emission, but the possibility of two-photon pair creation in an outer gap…
I argue that the problem of electromagnetically driven electron-positron cascades in magnetospheres of neutron stars must be addressed starting from first principles. I describe a general numerical algorithm for doing self-consistent…
We study Schwinger pair creation of charged particles due to the inhomogeneous electric field created by the thin electron layer at the surface of quark stars (the electrosphere). As suggested earlier, due to the low photon emissivity of…
Energy-angular distributions of electron-positron pair creation in collisions of a laser beam and a nonlaser photon are calculated using the $S$-matrix formalism. The laser field is modeled as a finite pulse, similar to the formulation…
We propose an all-optical, single-laser-pulse scheme for generating dense, relativistic, strongly-magnetized electron-positron pair plasma. The scheme involves the interaction of an extremely intense ($I \gtrsim \SI{e24}{\watt/\cm^2}$)…
At high luminosities black hole binaries show spectra with a strong disc component accompanied by an equally strong tail where at least some of the electrons are non-thermal. We reanalyze the simultaneous ASCA-RXTE-OSSE data from the 1998…