Pulsar
PSR J1905+0649_P
Millisecond pulsar · binary system
A millisecond pulsar spinning 36 times per second: an old neutron star spun up again (“recycled”) by matter transferred from a companion. It shares a 1.382 days orbit with a CO white dwarf. Period, spin-down, distance and orbit come from the ATNF Pulsar Catalogue; the beam geometry is illustrative.
| Type | Pulsar |
|---|---|
| Constellation | Aquila |
| Period | 27.464 ms (36 Hz) |
| Period derivative | 3.3×10⁻¹⁹ s/s |
| Characteristic age | 1.3 billion years |
| Magnetic field | 3.1×10⁹ G |
| Spin-down luminosity | 6.4×10³² erg/s |
| Dispersion measure | 187.7 pc/cm³ |
| Distance | 4,370 pc (14.3 thousand ly) |
| Companion | CO white dwarf (estimated), ~1.17 M☉ |
| Orbital period | 1.382 days |
| Eccentricity | 0.000025 |
| Discovery | 2025 · fast_gpps |
| Source | ATNF Pulsar Catalogue |
| Right ascension (J2000) | 19h 05m 05.3s |
| Declination (J2000) | +6° 49′ 49″ |
In the sky
Visible from the whole Northern Hemisphere and south to latitude 83° 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 14 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 253 million years.