Published August 10, 2011
| Published
Journal Article
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The White Dwarf Companion of a 2 M_☉ Neutron Star
- Creators
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Bhalerao, Varun B.
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Kulkarni, S. R.
Abstract
We report the optical discovery of the companion to the 2 M_☉ millisecond pulsar PSR J1614–2230. The optical colors show that the 0.5 M_☉ companion is a 2.2 Gyr old He-CO white dwarf. We infer that M during the accretion phase is <10^(-2), M_(edd). We show that the pulsar was born with a spin close to its current value, well below the rebirth line. The spin-down parameters, the mass of the pulsar, and the age of the system challenge the simple recycling model for the formation of millisecond pulsars.
Additional Information
© 2011 The American Astronomical Society. Received 2011 April 19; accepted 2011 June 15; published 2011 July 15. We are grateful to Scott Ransom for providing the source position in advance of the publication. We thank M. Kasliwal and A. Gal-Yam for undertaking the observations. Some of the data presented herein were obtained at the W. M. Keck Observatory, which is operated as a scientific partnership among the California Institute of Technology, the University of California, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Observatory was made possible by the generous financial support of the W. M. Keck Foundation. Facilities: Keck:I (LRIS)Attached Files
Published - Bhalerao2011p15629Astrophys_J_Lett.pdf
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Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 25158
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20110830-091647412
- W. M. Keck Foundation
- Created
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2011-08-30Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-09Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- Space Radiation Laboratory, Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences