Date:
Mon, 27/04/201512:00-13:30
Location:
Levin Building, Lecture Hall No. 8
TITLE: The Hunt for Millisecond Pulsars
ABSTRACT: Millisecond radio pulsars are nature's most perfect clock, with rotational
stabilities that can exceed 1 in 10^15 on long timescales. Thanks to their
amazingly high precision clock-like properties, millisecond pulsars are
extremely useful for studying a wide variety of astrophysical topics,
ranging from the equation-of-state of ultradense matter to testing
theories of relativistic gravity, such as General Relativity. Here I
describe current efforts to search for millisecond pulsars using the
world's largest telescopes, recent results, as well as the larger goal of
using an array of millisecond pulsars on the sky to make a direct
detection of gravitational waves in the nanohertz regime.
ABSTRACT: Millisecond radio pulsars are nature's most perfect clock, with rotational
stabilities that can exceed 1 in 10^15 on long timescales. Thanks to their
amazingly high precision clock-like properties, millisecond pulsars are
extremely useful for studying a wide variety of astrophysical topics,
ranging from the equation-of-state of ultradense matter to testing
theories of relativistic gravity, such as General Relativity. Here I
describe current efforts to search for millisecond pulsars using the
world's largest telescopes, recent results, as well as the larger goal of
using an array of millisecond pulsars on the sky to make a direct
detection of gravitational waves in the nanohertz regime.