Discovery of an Extremely Luminous Sporadic Radio Pulsar

Abstract

We have discovered PSR J2108+5055, an extremely luminous but sporadic mode-changing rotating radio transient (RRAT), with a period of 0.495 s using the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment/Fast Radio Burst instrument (CHIME/FRB). We show that the brightest pulse from PSR J2108+5055 has a flux density of 3.1+/-1.0 kJy, corresponding to a spectral luminosity of (7.5+/-2.3)x10^23 erg s^-1 Hz^-1, assuming a dispersion-measure-derived distance of 1.6+/-0.3 kpc. We place an upper limit on the duty cycle of PSR J2108+5055 at 0.002% and measure a surface magnetic field of 5.8x10^11 G, a characteristic age of 1.2x10^7 yr, and a spindown luminosity of 2.2x10^32 erg s^-1. Using a simple model based on the Green Bank North Celestial Cap (GBNCC) survey, we place an upper limit on the number of PSR J2108+5055-like sources with similar peak flux densities in the GBNCC survey area of ~80 RRATs. We show that if PSR J2108+5055 were placed at the edge of the Local Group of galaxies, the Five-Hundred-Meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST) would detect its brightest pulse. The second brightest pulse has a peak flux density of 1.5+/-0.7 kJy, and FAST would detect such a pulse out to ~1 Mpc, covering the inner Local Group, including Andromeda.