Fermi Space Telescope discovered 294 pulsar stars in the Universe

A new edition of the Third Catalog of Gamma-Ray Pulsars from the Fermi Large Area Telescope was recently published. Arrived loaded with 294 new neutron stars emitting extremely energetic pulses of radiation. It’s an impressive progress since the space telescope was launched in June 2008.

It was produced by an international team of astronomers led by the Bordeaux Astrophysics Laboratory in Gironde, France. the new pulsar collection now consists of more than 340 objects, 34 suspects are awaiting confirmation. The number detected exceeds the number of pulsars known before the launch of the mission by a factor of 27. The catalog is available in the supplement of The Astrophysical Journal.

David Smith, research director of the French laboratory that coordinated the study, says the following about the usefulness of the catalogue: “Pulsars address a wide range of astrophysical studies, from cosmic rays to stellar evolution, from gravitational waves to dark matter.”

What type of star are pulsars?

Considered the most dense and extreme objects in the universe, pulsars are a subcategory of neutron stars that are about the size of a city on Earth but have a mass greater than that of our Sun. These are the collapsed cores of former massive stars. masses whose masses are not sufficient to form a black hole.

The difference between an ordinary neutron star and a pulsar is, as the name suggests, pulsation. Pulsars emit powerful jets of radiation from their poles and spin 716 times per second, as if they were powerful beacons in the cosmic night. Less than 27 kilometers across, this tiny ball is the densest matter astronomers have ever examined.

How important are pulsars?

Pulsars are very useful for timekeeping. The reason for this is known to be Millisecond pulsars (MSPs) can complete their spin in up to ten milliseconds each. Of the new objects detected, 144 are MSPs, and the increasing number of missions that have recently reached the stars have the possibility of being used in space navigation.

Another application of pulsars is to use them to detect gravitational waves, the fluctuations in the curvature of space-time that Einstein predicted. The rhythm of these visceral objects may suggest expansions and contractions in space resulting from a major event. It allows relativity tests to be performed.

Before Fermi, co-author Lucas Guillemot of the University of Orleans says, “We didn’t know whether MSPs would be visible at high energies, but it turns out they emit mainly with gamma rays, and they now account for half of our energy.” catalog.” And of that total, at least 45 are “spider” pulsars, binary systems in which the pulsar absorbs material from its companion star and begins spinning even faster.

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