How Pulsars Shine: Poynting Flux Annihilation

Abstract

Recent solution of a pulsar (although likely correct, as agreeing with phenomenology of weak pulsars without a single adjustable) is somewhat unsatisfactory on account of being heavily numerical. Here the main features of a pulsar -- (i) the existence of a force-free zone, (ii) bounded by a non-force-free radiation zone, (iii) where colliding Poynting fluxes annihilate into curvature radiation -- are reproduced as an exact solution of the same pulsar equations but in a much simpler geometry.