Observations of Torque in Transient Accretion-Powered Pulsar Outbursts

Session 92 - Pulsars.
Oral session, Wednesday, January 15
Harbour C,

[92.06] Observations of Torque in Transient Accretion-Powered Pulsar Outbursts

M. H. Finger, M. Scott (USRA), L. Bildsten (UC.Berkeley), D. Chakrabarty (MIT), R. W. Nelson, T. A. Prince, B. A. Vaughan (Caltech), R. B. Wilson (NASA/MSFC)

Transient accretion-powered pulsars show large changes in luminosity and rapid changes in spin frequency which make them valuable laboratories for studying the interaction of accretion flows with the magnetic fields of neutron stars. Over the last five years the Burst and Transient Source Experiment (BATSE) onboard the Compton Observatory has observed more that 50 outbursts from transient accretion powered pulsars. In the largest of these outbursts the torques implied by the observed spin-up rates can only be explained by the presence of accretion disks. We compare the flux and spin-up rates observed during these outbursts with theoretical predictions for disk accretion onto a magnetic neutron star.

The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: Mark.Finger@msfc.nasa.gov

Program listing for Wednesday