Speaker
Description
One of the top science goals for SKA is the study of pulsars, and in particular using pulsars in so-called pulsar timing arrays (PTAs) to detect low-frequency gravitational waves (GWs). The regular monitoring (or timing) of a large number of millisecond pulsars (MSPs) is essential to making a GW detection. Pulsar surveys with SKA1 will reveal a large new population of millisecond pulsars (MSPs): we expect a total of 700-900 new MSPs with SKA-MID and 400-900 MSPs with SKA-LOW. The large scale SKA1-MID will allow the high precision timing of many known MSPs for GW detection and should lead to a GW detection within 2 to 6 years. Pulsar timing with the SKA will build on the current MeerKAT capabilities and the MeerTime pulsar timing program, whose results are very encouraging for future SKA1 capabilities. Pulsar timing data from MeerKAT and the SKA will also be merged with pulsar timing data from the International Pulsar Timing Array (IPTA) which includes the European Pulsar Timing Array (EPTA) collaboration. The SKA’s southern position is strategic and nicely complements the other PTA telescopes around the world. In Italy, we have observing and theoretical expertise with pulsars, PTAs and SKA. A few members of the INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Cagliari pulsar group are members of the SKA working groups on pulsars. Additionally, several members are part of the EPTA and the Large European Array for Pulsars (LEAP) which combines the simultaneous data from the five European EPTA telescopes, including the Sardinia Radio Telescope, and already has SKA1 capabilities; we also have theoretical expertise on PTAs at the Universita di Milano-Bicocca, as well as expertise on combining PTA and Gaia data at INAF-Torino. All of this places us in a strategic position to develop SKA capabilities for pulsars and to analyze and exploit future SKA pulsar data for GW detection.
| Reasearch area | Pulsars |
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