Joint Astrophysics Colloquium

Joint Astrophysics Seminar

XTEJ1810-197: The Amazing “Radio” Magnetar

Scott Ransom

NRAO

In 2003, the Rossi X-ray Timing Experiment satellite detected a large outburst from a point source in the Galactic plane which was soon identified as a new magnetar with a spin period of 5.5 seconds and a surface magnetic field strength well in excess of 10¹⁴ Gauss. A year later, a radio point source was detected at the position of the magnetar. This past year, we discovered that that point source was effectively 100% pulsed — the first known “Radio Magnetar”. The pulses are truly extraordinary: highly polarized, highly variable on a variety of timescales, and with an extremely flat spectrum. Observations with a variety of radio telescopes have been probing this new window on the exotic astrophysics of a magnetar, while others have used the unique properties of the radio emission to probe the Galaxy itself.