The 2022 High-energy Outburst and Radio Disappearing Act of the Magnetar 1E 1547.0-5408

We report the radio and high-energy properties of a new outburst from the radio-loud magnetar 1E 1547.0-5408. Following the detection of a short burst from the source with Swift-BAT on 2022 April 7, observations by NICER detected an increased flux peaking at (6.0 +/- 0.4) x 10(-11) erg s(-1) cm(-2) in the soft X-ray band, falling to a baseline level of 1.7 x 10(-11) erg s(-1) cm(-2) over a 17 day period. Joint spectroscopic measurements by NICER and NuSTAR indicated no change in the hard nonthermal tail despite the prominent increase in soft X-rays. Observations at radio wavelengths with Murriyang, the 64 m Parkes radio telescope, revealed that the persistent radio emission from the magnetar disappeared at least 22 days prior to the initial Swift-BAT detection and was redetected two weeks later. Such behavior is unprecedented in a radio-loud magnetar, and may point to an unnoticed slow rise in the high-energy activity prior to the detected short bursts. Finally, our combined radio and X-ray timing revealed the outburst coincided with a spin-up glitch, where the spin frequency and spin-down rate increased by 0.2 +/- 0.1 mu Hz and (-2.4 +/- 0.1) x 10(-12) s(-2), respectively. A linear increase in the spin-down rate of (-2.0 +/- 0.1) x 10(-19) s(-3) was also observed over 147 days of postoutburst timing. Our results suggest that the outburst may have been associated with a reconfiguration of the quasi-polar field lines, likely signaling a changing twist, accompanied by spatially broader heating of the surface and a brief quenching of the radio signal, yet without any measurable impact on the hard X-ray properties.

Automated summary

We report the radio and high-energy properties of a new outburst from the radio-loud magnetar 1E 1547.0-5408. The outburst was associated with a spin-up glitch and a concurrent disappearance and reappearance of persistent radio emission. The soft X-ray flux increased significantly while the hard nonthermal tail remained unchanged.