Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope Observations of Gamma-ray Pulsars

TL;DR

The Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has significantly advanced gamma-ray pulsar detection, discovering both known and new pulsars through improved sensitivity and innovative search techniques, enhancing our understanding of neutron stars.

Contribution

This paper reports on the early results from Fermi, including detection of known pulsars and new discoveries via blind searches and timing campaigns, demonstrating the telescope's capabilities.

Findings

Detection of all previously known gamma-ray pulsars.

Discovery of new gamma-ray pulsars through blind searches.

High-precision timing results from Fermi data.

Abstract

The Large Area Telescope on the recently launched Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope (formerly GLAST), with its large field of view and effective area, combined with its excellent timing capabilities, is poised to revolutionize the field of gamma-ray astrophysics. The large improvement in sensitivity over EGRET is expected to result in the discovery of many new gamma-ray pulsars, which in turn should lead to fundamental advances in our understanding of pulsar physics and the role of neutron stars in the Galaxy. Almost immediately after launch, Fermi clearly detected all previously known gamma-ray pulsars and is producing high precision results on these. An extensive radio and X-ray timing campaign of known (primarily radio) pulsars is being carried out in order to facilitate the discovery of new gamma-ray pulsars. In addition, a highly efficient time-differencing technique is being used to conduct blind searches for radio-quiet pulsars, which has already resulted in new discoveries. I present some recent results from searches for pulsars carried out on Fermi data, both blind searches, and using contemporaneous timing of known radio pulsars.