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Session 50 - Pulsars in the UV and Visible.
Topical, Oral session, Wednesday, June 10
Friars,
Isolated pulsars radiate by accelerating particles away from the neutron star rather than by accreting material from a companion. According to the vector model of pulsar emission [F. G. Smith, 1986, MNRAS, 219, 729; 1991, Comm. Ap., 15, 207; A. Lyne amp; F. G. Smith, 1990, "Pulsar Astronomy", Cambridge U. Press], the IR to gamma-ray emission from isolated pulsars comes from a region near their velocity- of-light co-rotation cylinder. (The radio emission is generated in a different region over the magnetic poles.) A comparison of the predictions of the vector model with HST observations of the Crab pulsar and PSR B0540-69 in the UV and visible shows that the frequency dependence of both the pulse profile and polarization are consistent with the predictions of the model.
