No detectable radio emission from the magnetar-like pulsar in Kes 75

TL;DR

This study conducted deep radio observations of the magnetar-like pulsar PSR J1846-0258 in Kes 75 and found no detectable radio emission, setting stringent upper limits and providing insights into its magnetic properties.

Contribution

First deep radio search for PSR J1846-0258 during its magnetar-like activity, establishing upper limits on radio emission and magnetic field.

Findings

No radio emission detected from PSR J1846-0258.

Set upper limit of 4.9 μJy on pulsed radio emission.

Observed radio pulses from nearby RRAT J1846-02 and constrained its magnetic field.

Abstract

The rotation-powered pulsar PSR J1846-0258 in the supernova remnant Kes 75 was recently shown to have exhibited magnetar-like X-ray bursts in mid-2006. Radio emission has not yet been observed from this source, but other magnetar-like sources have exhibited transient radio emission following X-ray bursts. We report on a deep 1.9 GHz radio observation of PSR J1846-0258 with the 100-m Green Bank Telescope in late 2007 designed to search for radio pulsations or bursts from this target. We have also analyzed three shorter serendipitous 1.4 GHz radio observations of the source taken with the 64-m Parkes telescope during the 2006 bursting period. We detected no radio emission from PSR J1846-0258 in either the Green Bank or Parkes datasets. We place an upper limit of 4.9 \mu Jy on coherent pulsed emission from PSR J1846-0258 based on the 2007 November 2 observation, and an upper limit of 27 \mu Jy around the time of the X-ray bursts. Serendipitously, we observed radio pulses from the nearby RRAT J1846-02, and place a 3\sigma confidence level upper limit on its period derivative of 1.7 * 10^{-13}, implying its surface dipole magnetic field is less than 2.6 * 10^{13} G.