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Issue A&A
Volume 400, Number 1, March II 2003
Page(s) 265 - 270
Section Stellar atmospheres
DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361:20021882



A&A 400, 265-270 (2003)
DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361:20021882

Deep BVR imaging of the field of the millisecond pulsar PSR J0030+0451 with the VLT

A. B. Koptsevich1, P. Lundqvist2, N. I. Serafimovich1, 2, Yu. A. Shibanov1 and J. Sollerman2

1  Ioffe Physical Technical Institute, Politekhnicheskaya 26, St. Petersburg, 194021, Russia
2  Stockholm Observatory, AlbaNova, Department of Astronomy, 106 91 Stockholm, Sweden

(Received 30 October 2002 / Accepted 17 December 2002)

Abstract
We report on deep BVR-imaging of the field of the nearby millisecond pulsar PSR J0030+0451 obtained with the ESO/VLT/FORS2. We do not detect any optical counterpart down to $B \ga 27.3$, $V \ga 27.0$ and $R \ga 27.0$ in the immediate vicinity of the radio pulsar position. The closest detected sources are offset by $\ga$3 $\arcsec$, and they are excluded as counterpart candidates by our astrometry. Using our upper limits in the optical, and including recent XMM-Newton X-ray data we show that any nonthermal power-law spectral component of neutron star magnetospheric origin, as suggested by the interpretation of X-ray data, must be suppressed by at least a factor of ~500 in the optical range. This either rules out the nonthermal interpretation or suggests a dramatic spectral break in the 0.003-0.1 keV range of the power-law spectrum. Such a situation has never been observed in the optical/X-ray spectral region of ordinary pulsars, and the origin of such a break is unclear. An alternative interpretation with a purely thermal X-ray spectrum is consistent with our optical upper limits. In this case the X-ray emission is dominated by hot polar caps of the pulsar.


Key words: pulsars: general -- pulsars: individual: PSR J0030+0451 -- stars: neutron

Offprint request: A. B . Koptsevich, kopts@astro.ioffe.rssi.ru

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