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Pulsar Magnetospheres: Beyond the Flat Spacetime Dipole

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arxiv 1604.04625 v3 pith:KZFPRLDV submitted 2016-04-15 astro-ph.HE gr-qc

classification astro-ph.HEgr-qc
keywords magneticgeneralfieldpulsarrelativitycapscomponentdipole
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Most studies of the pulsar magnetosphere have assumed a pure magnetic dipole in flat spacetime. However, recent work suggests that the effects of general relativity are in fact of vital importance and that realistic pulsar magnetic fields will have a significant nondipolar component. We introduce a general analytical method for studying the axisymmetric force-free magnetosphere of a slowly-rotating star of arbitrary magnetic field, mass, radius and moment of inertia, including all the effects of general relativity. We confirm that spacelike current is generically present in the polar caps (suggesting a pair production region), irrespective of the stellar magnetic field. We show that general relativity introduces a ~60% correction to the formula for the dipolar component of the surface magnetic field inferred from spindown. Finally, we show that the location and shape of the polar caps can be modified dramatically by even modestly strong higher moments. This can affect emission processes occurring near the star and may help explain the modified beam characteristics of millisecond pulsars.

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Reviewed papers in the Pith corpus that reference this work. Sorted by Pith novelty score. Full citation record

  1. Measuring the electric dipole moment of the neutron using neutron star spin-down

    astro-ph.HE 2026-08 conditional novelty 6.0 of 10

    The thesis derives a conditional 90% limit |d_n| < 4.42e-25 e cm from the spin-down budget of PSR J0437-4715 via an effective magnetic-quadrupole channel, the first astrophysical bound of this kind.

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