Gross-Pitaevskii model of pulsar glitches

TL;DR

This paper presents large-scale quantum simulations of pulsar glitches using a Gross-Pitaevskii model, revealing power-law size distributions, correlations with pinning strength, and dynamics consistent with collective vortex unpinning.

Contribution

It introduces the first large-scale quantum mechanical simulations of pulsar glitches with detailed vortex dynamics and statistical analysis, advancing understanding of glitch mechanisms.

Findings

Power-law distributions of glitch sizes match observations.

Glitch rate scales with electromagnetic spin-down torque.

Strong correlation between pinning strength and glitch size.

Abstract

The first large-scale quantum mechanical simulations of pulsar glitches are presented, using a Gross-Pitaevskii model of the crust-superfluid system in the presence of pinning. Power-law distributions of simulated glitch sizes are obtained, in accord with astronomical observations, with exponents ranging from -0.55 to -1.26. Examples of large-scale simulations, containing $\sim 200$ vortices, reveal that these statistics persist in the many-vortex limit. Waiting-time distributions are also constructed. These and other statistics support the hypothesis that catastrophic unpinning mediated by collective vortex motion produces glitches; indeed, such collective events are seen in time-lapse movies of superfluid density. Three principal trends are observed. (1) The glitch rate scales proportional to the electromagnetic spin-down torque. (2) A strong positive correlation is found between the strength of vortex pinning and mean glitch size. (3) The spin-down dynamics depend less on the pinning site abundance once the latter exceeds one site per vortex, suggesting that unpinned vortices travel a distance comparable to the inter-vortex spacing before repinning.