Probing the Eclipse Region of a Binary Millisecond Pulsar
B. W. Stappers (MSSSO, Australia),
M. Bailes (ATNF, CSIRO, Australia and University of Melbourne, Australia),
A. G. Lyne (NRAL, Jodrell Bank, UK),
R. N. Manchester (ATNF, CSIRO, Australia),
N. D'Amico (Bologna, Italy),
T. M. Tauris (Aarhus University, Denmark and ATNF, CSIRO, Australia),
D. R. Lorimer (NRAL, Jodrell Bank, UK and MPIfR, Bonn, Germany),
S. Johnston (RCfTA, Unviersity of Sydney, Australia),
J. S. Sandhu (Caltech, USA)
Abstract We report the discovery of a new eclipsing millisecond binary pulsar system, PSR J2051-0827. The pulsar has a period of 4.5 ms and is in a very compact circular orbit with a companion of mass ~0.03 Msun. Observations at low frequencies show that the eclipse duration is approximately 10% of the orbital period. However, at high radio frequencies, pulses are often detected throughout the eclipse region, revealing interesting time-variable density structure in the eclipsing plasma.