Binary population synthesis of the Galactic canonical pulsar population

TL;DR

This study uses binary population synthesis to model the Galactic pulsar population, accounting for observational biases and pulsar motions, and compares the results with radio and gamma-ray observations to understand pulsar properties.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive synthesis model that matches observed pulsar populations and explores gamma-ray emission from low Edot pulsars.

Findings

Broad agreement with observed radio and gamma-ray pulsar populations.

Reproduces the ratio of radio-loud to radio-quiet gamma-ray pulsars.

Confirms natal kicks influence pulsar latitude and Edot correlation.

Abstract

Pulsars are rapidly rotating neutron stars that emit radiation across the electromagnetic spectrum, from radio to gamma-rays. We use the rapid binary population synthesis suite COMPAS to model the Galactic population of canonical pulsars. We account for both radio and gamma-ray selection effects, as well as the motion of pulsars in the Galactic potential due to natal kicks. We compare our models to the catalogues of pulsars detected in the radio, and those detected in gamma-rays by Fermi, and find broad agreement with both populations. We reproduce the observed ratio of radio-loud to radio-quiet gamma-ray pulsars. We further examine the possibility of low spin-down luminosity (Edot) pulsars emitting weak, unpulsed gamma-ray emission and attempt to match this with results from a recent gamma-ray stacking survey of these pulsars. We confirm the correlation between the latitude of a pulsar and its Edot arises due to natal kicks imparted to pulsars at birth, assuming that all pulsars are born in the Galactic disk.