Pulsars are these tiny dead stars that can spin at all manner of speeds, and using the fairly new and truly giant FAST radio telescope in China, scientists are starting to document these extremes. 

In a new paper in Astronomy & Astrophysics, researchers release the first findings of the Galactic Plane Pulsar Snapshot. With five percent of the survey complete, they have already found 201 pulsars, including some of the lowest energy pulsars so far detected, and sixteen binary systems. 

While pulsars are interesting for their own qualities – they are more massive than the sun, the diameter of Manhattan, and can spin thousands of times a second – pulsars are weird enough on their own to be worth studying, but they are also useful for looking at the properties of our galaxy. As their pulses travel through space, they are dispersed by the particles scattered about. Pulsar pulses are particularly sensitive to the distribution of rogue electrons, and these early results seem to indicate that there are a lot more rogue electrons than previously understood. Over time, as this survey grows, we’ll be able to map out this distribution and understand how it affects our view of the universe beyond.

More Information

CAS press release

“The FAST Galactic Plane Pulsar Snapshot survey: I. Project design and pulsar discoveries,” J. L. Han et al., 2021 May, Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics