Chandra Observations of Black-Widow Pulsars

TL;DR

This paper presents the first X-ray observations of four binary millisecond pulsars, revealing orbital variability and intrabinary shock emission in some, and providing spectral analysis of their X-ray properties.

Contribution

First X-ray observations of four black-widow pulsars, demonstrating orbital variability and intrabinary shock emission evidence.

Findings

Two pulsars show significant orbital variability and eclipse-related flux minima.

Spectral fits indicate power-law indices from 1.4 to 2.3 and blackbody temperatures in hundreds of eV.

One pulsar exhibits a hard X-ray component, supporting intrabinary shock emission presence.

Abstract

We describe the first X-ray observations of binary millisecond pulsars PSRs J0023+0923, J1810+1744, J2215+5135, and J2256-1024. All four are Fermi gamma-ray sources and three are 'black-widow' pulsars, with companions of mass < 0.1 solar masses. Data were taken using the Chandra X-Ray Observatory and covered a full binary orbit for each pulsar. Two pulsars, PSRs J2215+5135 and J2256-1024, show significant orbital variability and X-ray flux minima at the times of eclipses observed at radio wavelengths. This phenomenon is consistent with intrabinary shock emission characteristic of black-widow pulsars. The other two pulsars, PSRs J0023+0923 and J1810+1744, do not demonstrate significant variability, but are fainter than the other two sources. Spectral fits yield power-law indices that range from 1.4 to 2.3 and blackbody temperatures in the hundreds of eV. The spectrum for PSR J2215+5135 shows a significant hard X-ray component (41% of counts are above 2 keV), which is additional evidence for the presence of intrabinary shock emission.