Geometric modelling of radio and γ-ray light curves of 6 Fermi LAT pulsars

Abstract

The Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) has recently reported the detection of pulsed γ-rays from 6 young pulsars (J0631+1036, J0659+1414, J0742−2822, J1420−6048, J1509−5850, and J1718−3825), all exhibiting single-peaked pulse profiles [19]. High-quality radio polarization data are also available for 5 of these pulsars, allowing derivation of constraints on their viewing geometries. We obtain independent constraints on the viewing geometries of these pulsars by using a geometric pulsar emission code to model the Fermi LAT and radio light curves. We find fits for the magnetic inclination and observer angles α and ζ with typical errors of ∼ 5 ◦ . Our results are generally consistent with those obtained by [19], although we do find differences in some cases. Our model may lastly provide a framework to constrain the radio emission altitude