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Published Online January 13, 2005
Science DOI: 10.1126/science.1108632

Research Articles

Submitted on December 13, 2004
Accepted on January 5, 2005

Twenty-One Millisecond Pulsars in Terzan 5 Using the Green Bank Telescope

Scott M. Ransom 1*, Jason W. T. Hessels 2, Ingrid H. Stairs 3, Paulo C. C. Freire 4, Fernando Camilo 5, Victoria M. Kaspi 2, David L. Kaplan 6

1 NRAO, 520 Edgemont Rd., Charlottesville, VA 22903, USA; Department of Physics, McGill University, Montreal, QC H3A 2T8, Canada.
2 Department of Physics, McGill University, Montreal, QC H3A 2T8, Canada.
3 Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of British Columbia, 6224 Agricultural Road, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1, Canada.
4 NAIC, Arecibo Observatory, HC03 Box 53995, PR 00612, USA.
5 Columbia Astrophysics Laboratory, Columbia University, 550 West 120th Street, New York, NY 10027, USA.
6 Center for Space Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 70 Vassar Street, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed.
Scott M. Ransom , E-mail: sransom{at}nrao.edu

We have discovered 21 millisecond pulsars (MSPs) in the globular cluster Terzan 5 using the Green Bank Telescope, bringing the total of known MSPs in Terzan 5 to 24. These discoveries confirm fundamental predictions of globular cluster and binary system evolution. Thirteen of the new MSPs are in binaries, of which two show eclipses and two have highly eccentric orbits. The relativistic periastron advance for the two eccentric systems indicates that at least one of these pulsars has a mass > 1.68 M⊚ at 95% confidence. Such large neutron star masses constrain the equation of state of matter at or beyond the nuclear equilibrium density.


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
An Eccentric Binary Millisecond Pulsar in the Galactic Plane.
D. J. Champion, S. M. Ransom, P. Lazarus, F. Camilo, C. Bassa, V. M. Kaspi, D. J. Nice, P. C. C. Freire, I. H. Stairs, J. van Leeuwen, et al. (2008)
Science 320, 1309-1312
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »
A Radio Pulsar Spinning at 716 Hz.
J. W. T. Hessels, S. M. Ransom, I. H. Stairs, P. C. C. Freire, V. M. Kaspi, and F. Camilo (2006)
Science 311, 1901-1904
   Abstract »    Full Text »    PDF »


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