Parkes observations for project P1054 semester 2022OCTS_01

With this proposal we ask time to continue our timing follow-up campaign of pulsars discovered with the MeerKAT telescope. Eighteen sources have been discovered in targeted observations of Fermi unidentified point sources, six in the Small Magellanic Cloud, 54 in Globular Clusters and 66 in a survey of the Galactic plane. A large fraction of the new discoveries are recycled pulsars (including at least one double neutron star system and several 'spider' binaries), or young pulsars. Timing observations have an essential role in exploiting the full potential of any pulsar discovery, allowing the precise measurement of rotational, astrometric and orbital parameters which, in turn, give us powerful tools to improve our understanding of the physics in extreme environments as well as of the population of neutron stars as a whole. The UWL receiver of the Parkes telescope is a sensitive, versatile instrument that is allowing us to successfully time these new sources, in the bright-end of TRAPUM discoveries. The UWL has also the unique advantage of allowing detailed studies of the eclipses of the so-called 'spider' pulsars, which make up about 1/3rd of the sources we aim at following-up with this project.

本提案申请观测时长，以延续对MeerKAT望远镜发现的脉冲星开展的计时随访项目。本次新发现的脉冲星源共计144颗：其中在费米（Fermi）未证认点源的靶向观测中发现18颗，小麦哲伦星云（Small Magellanic Cloud）中发现6颗，球状星团（Globular Clusters）中发现54颗，银道面巡天中发现66颗。这批新发现源中，绝大多数为再循环脉冲星（含至少1个双中子星系统与多颗“蜘蛛”双星系统脉冲星），亦包含部分年轻脉冲星。计时观测对于充分发挥每一次脉冲星发现的科学价值至关重要，可实现对其自转、天体测量与轨道参数的精准测量，进而为我们深入理解极端环境下的物理规律，以及整体中子星族群的特性提供强有力的研究工具。帕克斯望远镜（Parkes telescope）搭载的UWL接收机（UWL receiver）是一款高灵敏度、多用途的观测设备，可助力我们成功完成TRAPUM巡天亮端这批新发现源的计时观测工作。此外，UWL接收机具备独特优势，可开展针对所谓“蜘蛛”脉冲星掩食现象的精细化研究——这类源约占本项目拟随访源总数的三分之一。