A binary pulsar in a 53-minute orbit.

ABSTRACT: Spider pulsars are neutron stars that have a companion star in a close orbit. The companion star sheds material to the neutron star, spinning it up to millisecond rotation periods, while the orbit shortens to hours. The companion is eventually ablated and destroyed by the pulsar wind and radiation^1,2. Spider pulsars are key for studying the evolutionary link between accreting X-ray pulsars and isolated millisecond pulsars, pulsar irradiation effects and the birth of massive neutron stars^3-6. Black widow pulsars in extremely compact orbits (as short as 62 minutes⁷) have companions with masses much smaller than 0.1 M_⊙. They may have evolved from redback pulsars with companion masses of about 0.1-0.4 M_⊙ and orbital periods of less than 1 

SUBMITTER: Pan Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10468392 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature