Pulsar
PSR B1839+09 (J1841+0912)
Radio pulsar
A neutron star spinning once every 0.381 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 | Ophiuchus |
| Period | 381.3 ms |
| Period derivative | 1.1×10⁻¹⁵ s/s |
| Characteristic age | 5.5 million years |
| Magnetic field | 6.5×10¹¹ G |
| Spin-down luminosity | 7.8×10³² erg/s |
| Dispersion measure | 49.2 pc/cm³ |
| Distance | 1,664 pc (5.4 thousand ly) |
| Discovery | 1978 · mol2, ar3, gb3, gb4, lotaas, misc, pkssw, fast_gpps |
| Source | ATNF Pulsar Catalogue |
| Right ascension (J2000) | 18h 41m 56.0s |
| Declination (J2000) | +9° 12′ 07″ |
In the sky
Visible from the whole Northern Hemisphere and south to latitude 81° S. It stands highest at midnight in June, the best time to observe it.
Through a telescope from Earth
Light's journey
The light you see tonight set out 5,427 years ago. At that time the first farming villages were being founded; there was no writing yet. At the speed of Voyager 1, the fastest craft leaving the Solar System (16.9 km per second), the trip would take 96 million years.