A giant glitch in PSR J1718-3718

Abstract

Radio timing observations of the high-magnetic-field pulsar PSR J1718-3718 have shown that it suffered a large glitch with Dnu_g/nu = (33.25 +/- 0.01) x 10^{-6} between 2007 September (MJD 54336) and 2009 January (MJD 54855). This is the largest pulsar glitch ever observed. As is common, there was a small increase in braking torque at the time of the glitch but, unlike all other pulsars, the braking torque has continued to increase over the two years since the glitch. Polarization observations show that the mean pulse profile has about 30% linear polarization with a smooth change of position angle through the pulse and give a rotation measure of -160 +/- 22 rad m^{-2}. There was no detectable change in pulse profile at the time of the glitch. The timing observations also gave an improved dispersion measure of 371.1 +/- 1.7 cm^{-3}pc.