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XMM-Newton observations of the Vela pulsar

Kaya Mori, Charles J. Hailey, Frits Paerels, Silvia Zane

astro-pharXiv:astro-ph/0306517

Abstract

We present spectral analysis from XMM-Newton observations of the Vela pulsar. We analyzed thermal emission from the pulsar dominating below ~ 1 keV since extracted spectra are heavily contaminated by nebular emission at higher energy. Featureless high-resolution spectra of the Reflection Grating Spectrometer aboard XMM-Newton suggest the presence of a hydrogen atmosphere, as previously indicated by Chandra results. Both the temperature and radius are consistent with those values deduced from Chandra. The derived Chandra and XMM-Newton temperature of T∞ ~ (6.4-7.1)*105 K at its age of ~104 years is below the standard cooling curve.

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