Timing Noise
A pulsar (portmanteau of pulsating star) is a highly magnetized, rotating neutron star that emits a beam of electromagnetic radiation. This radiation can only be observed when the beam of emission is pointing toward the Earth, much the way a lighthouse can only be seen when the light is pointed in the direction of an observer, and is responsible for the pulsed appearance of emission. Neutron stars are very dense, and have short, regular rotational periods. This produces a very precise interval between pulses that range from roughly milliseconds to seconds for an individual pulsar.
The precise periods of pulsars makes them useful tools. Observations of a pulsar in a binary neutron star system were used to indirectly confirm the existence of gravitational radiation. The first extrasolar planets were discovered around a pulsar, PSR B1257+12. Certain types of pulsars rival atomic clocks in their accuracy in keeping time.
Read more about Timing Noise: Discovery, Nomenclature, Formation, Categories, Applications, Significant Pulsars, See Also
Famous quotes containing the words timing and/or noise:
“Is it a new spring star
Within the timing chill,
Talking, or just a mime,
That rises in the blood
Thin Jack-and-Jilling seas
Without the human will?”
—Allen Tate (18991979)
“While we were thus engaged in the twilight, we heard faintly, from far down the stream, what sounded like two strokes of a woodchoppers axe, echoing dully through the grim solitude.... When we told Joe of this, he exclaimed, By George, Ill bet that was a moose! They make a noise like that. These sounds affected us strangely, and by their very resemblance to a familiar one, where they probably had so different an origin, enhanced the impression of solitude and wildness.”
—Henry David Thoreau (18171862)