X-ray Emission From The Planet Pulsar B1257+12

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We report the detection of the millisecond pulsar B1257+12 with the Chandra X-ray Observatory. In a 20 ks exposure we detected 25 photons from the pulsar, with energies between 0.4 and 2.0 keV, corresponding to the flux of (4.4+/-0.9)*10^{-15} ergs/s/cm^2 in this energy range. The X-ray spectrum can be described by a power-law model, with photon index of 2.8 and luminosity of 2.5*10^{29} ergs/s in the 0.3-8 keV band, for a plausible distance of 500 pc and hydrogen column density of 3.1*10^{20} cm^{-2}. Alternatively, the spectrum can be fitted by a blackbody model with a temperature of 0.22 keV and projected emitting area about 2000 m^2. If the thermal X-rays are emitted from two symmetric polar caps, the bolometric luminosity of the two caps is 3*10^{29} ergs/s. The observed X-ray efficiency of the pulsar, about 3*10^{-5}, is lower than for a typical millisecond pulsar. This could be explained by either an unfavorable orientation of the X-ray pulsar beam (e.g., if one of the polar caps is much brighter than the other and remains invisible for most part of the pulsar period). Alternatively, it could be attributed to absorption of X-rays in circumpulsar matter, such as a flaring debris disk left over after formation of the planetary system around the pulsar.
This work was partially supported by NASA grants NAG5-10865 and NAS8-01128 and Chandra award SV4-74018.

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