General relativistic corrections in the gamma-ray emission from pulsars

Abstract

view Abstract Citations (42) References (22) Co-Reads Similar Papers Volume Content Graphics Metrics Export Citation NASA/ADS General Relativistic Corrections in the Gamma-Ray Emission from Pulsars Gonthier, P. L. ; Harding, A. K. Abstract We examine the importance of general relativistic corrections to the production of gamma rays near the surface of a neutron star. Due to the change in the magnetic dipole field in curved spacetime, the polar cap angle decreases by 30% compared to flat spacetime. However, the curved photon trajectories compensate for the decrease in the polar cap angle, and, as a result, the pulse profile of the photons emitted parallel to the field is expected to be very similar in curved spacetime and in flat spacetime. We find that the curved spacetime metric significantly increases the magnitude of the magnetic field and, therefore, the attenuation coefficients of curvature radiation gamma rays for pair production in a magnetic field can be increased by factors as large as 100. As a resutl the survival distance of 1 GeV photons for pair production is decreased by a factor of 2 for B is approximately 1012 G. Publication: The Astrophysical Journal Pub Date: April 1994 DOI: 10.1086/174020 Bibcode: 1994ApJ...425..767G Keywords: Gamma Ray Spectra; Neutron Stars; Pulsars; Relativistic Effects; Compton Effect; Corotation; Gamma Ray Observatory; Magnetic Dipoles; Pair Production; Schwarzschild Metric; Space-Time Functions; Astrophysics; STARS: PULSARS: GENERAL; GAMMA RAYS: THEORY; RADIATION MECHANISMS: MISCELLANEOUS; RELATIVITY; STARS: NEUTRON full text sources ADS | data products SIMBAD (3)