Pulsar
PSR B1503-66 (J1507-6640)
Radio pulsar
A neutron star spinning once every 0.356 seconds; the beams from its magnetic poles sweep across Earth on every turn. Period, spin-down, distance and orbit come from the ATNF Pulsar Catalogue; the beam geometry is illustrative.
| Type | Pulsar |
|---|---|
| Constellation | Triangulum Australe |
| Period | 355.7 ms |
| Period derivative | 1.2×10⁻¹⁵ s/s |
| Characteristic age | 4.9 million years |
| Magnetic field | 6.5×10¹¹ G |
| Spin-down luminosity | 1.0×10³³ erg/s |
| Dispersion measure | 130.2 pc/cm³ |
| Distance | 4,819 pc (15.7 thousand ly) |
| Discovery | 1978 · mol2, htru_pks, misc, pkssw |
| Source | ATNF Pulsar Catalogue |
| Right ascension (J2000) | 15h 07m 48.6s |
| Declination (J2000) | −66° 40′ 58″ |
In the sky
Visible from the whole Southern Hemisphere and north to latitude 23° N. South of latitude 23° S it never sets. It stands highest at midnight in May, the best time to observe it.
Through a telescope from Earth
Light's journey
The light you see tonight set out 16 thousand years ago. At that time Homo sapiens was spreading out of Africa; there was no farming yet. At the speed of Voyager 1, the fastest craft leaving the Solar System (16.9 km per second), the trip would take 279 million years.