Journal
ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL
Volume 807, Issue 1, Pages -Publisher
IOP PUBLISHING LTD
DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/807/1/62
Keywords
accretion, accretion disks; pulsars: individual (PSR J1023+0038); X-rays: binaries
Categories
Funding
- ESA Member States
- NASA
- NWO Vrije Competitie grant
- NWO Vidi fellowship
- ERC [337062]
- NWO Veni Fellowship
- NSERC
- FQRNT Centre de Recherche Astrophysique du Quebec
- Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR)
- Canada Research Chairs Program
- Lorne Trottier Chair in Astrophysics and Cosmology
- STFC [ST/L000768/1] Funding Source: UKRI
- Science and Technology Facilities Council [ST/L000768/1] Funding Source: researchfish
- European Research Council (ERC) [337062] Funding Source: European Research Council (ERC)
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Accreting millisecond X-ray pulsars (AMXPs) are an important subset of low-mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs) in which coherent X-ray pulsations can be observed during occasional, bright outbursts (X-ray luminosity L-X similar to 10(36) erg s(-1)) . These pulsations show that matter is being channeled onto the neutron star's magnetic poles. However, such sources spend most of their time in a low-luminosity, quiescent state (L-X less than or similar to 10(34) erg s(-1)), where the nature of the accretion flow onto the neutron star (if any) is not well understood. Here we report that the millisecond pulsar/LMXB transition object PSR J1023+0038 intermittently shows coherent X-ray pulsations at luminosities nearly 100 times fainter than observed in any other AMXP. We conclude that in spite of its low luminosity, PSR J1023+0038 experiences episodes of channeled accretion, a discovery that challenges existing models for accretion onto magnetized neutron stars.
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