Parkes observations for project P361 semester 2012APRS

The neutron star-white dwarf relativistic binary PSR J1141-6545 is a unique target for testing General Relativity and its competing alternatives. Our eight years of timing observations have enabled measurements of its orbital decay and Shapiro delay, as well as accurate determination of the two stellar masses. The limits derived from our timing for the strongly non-linear coupling parameter of tensor-scalar theories of gravity are currently the most stringent to date and are expected to improve dramatically over the next few years. In light of these encouraging results and future prospects, we propose to continue regular observations of this pulsar.

脉冲星PSR J1141-6545所在的中子星-白矮星相对论性双星系统，是检验广义相对论（General Relativity）及其竞争性替代理论的独特观测靶标。我们历时八年的计时观测，不仅实现了对其轨道衰减与夏皮罗延迟(Shapiro delay)的测量，还精准测定了两颗恒星的质量。基于本次计时观测得到的张量-标量引力理论强非线性耦合参数约束，是目前为止精度最高的同类约束，且预计在未来数年内将实现大幅提升。鉴于这些令人振奋的研究结果与未来发展前景，我们提议继续对该脉冲星开展常规观测。