Discovery of extended X-ray emission around the highly magnetic RRAT J1819-1458

TL;DR

This study reports the discovery of extended X-ray emission around the highly magnetic RRAT J1819-1458, suggesting a possible pulsar-powered nebula with high X-ray efficiency, and refines its positional and pulsation data.

Contribution

First detection of extended X-ray emission around RRAT J1819-1458, indicating a potential pulsar wind nebula powered by magnetic energy rather than spin-down power.

Findings

Extended X-ray emission with a compact and diffuse component.

X-ray efficiency of about 0.2, higher than typical pulsar PWNe.

Refined positional accuracy and confirmed X-ray pulsations.

Abstract

We report on the discovery of extended X-ray emission around the high magnetic field Rotating Radio Transient J1819-1458. Using a 30ks Chandra ACIS-S observation, we found significant evidence for extended X-ray emission with a peculiar shape: a compact region out to 5.5", and more diffuse emission extending out to ~13" from the source. The most plausible interpretation is a nebula somehow powered by the pulsar, although the small number of counts prevents a conclusive answer on the nature of this emission. RRAT J1819-1458's spin-down energy loss rate (Edot~3x10^{32} erg/s) is much lower than that of other pulsars with observed spin-down powered pulsar wind nebulae (PWNe), and implies a rather high X-ray efficiency of eta_{X} = L_(pwn; 0.5-8keV)/Edot~0.2 at converting spin-down power into the PWN X-ray emission. This suggests the need of an additional source of energy rather than the spin-down power alone, such as the high magnetic energy of this source. Furthermore, this Chandra observation allowed us to refine the positional accuracy of RRAT J1819-1458 to a radius of ~0.3", and confirms the presence of X-ray pulsations and the ~1keV absorption line, previously observed in the X-ray emission of this source.