Pulsar
PSR B1908+00A (J1911+0101A)
Millisecond pulsar · in the globular cluster NGC6760
A millisecond pulsar spinning 276 times per second: an old neutron star spun up again (“recycled”) by matter transferred from a companion. It shares a 3.38 h orbit with a very-low-mass companion. Period, spin-down, distance and orbit come from the ATNF Pulsar Catalogue; the beam geometry is illustrative.
| Type | Pulsar |
|---|---|
| Constellation | Aquila |
| Period | 3.619 ms (276 Hz) |
| Dispersion measure | 202.7 pc/cm³ |
| Distance | 8,400 pc (27.4 thousand ly) |
| Location | in the globular cluster NGC6760 |
| Companion | very-low-mass companion (estimated), ~0.020 M☉ |
| Orbital period | 3.38 h |
| Discovery | 1993 · misc, fast_gpps |
| Source | ATNF Pulsar Catalogue |
| Right ascension (J2000) | 19h 11m 11.1s |
| Declination (J2000) | +1° 02′ 10″ |
In the sky
Visible from the whole Northern Hemisphere and south to latitude 89° S. It stands highest at midnight in July, the best time to observe it.
Through a telescope from Earth
Light's journey
The light you see tonight set out 27 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 486 million years.