National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA) discovers five new millisecond pulsars using uGMRT

Key facts

• A team led by doctoral student Jyotirmoy Das at the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics (NCRA) discovered five new millisecond pulsars in the ancient globular clusters Messier 69 (M69) and Messier 70 (M70).
• The detections were made using India’s upgraded Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope (uGMRT), marking the first-ever pulsar detections in these specific clusters.
• The researchers identified two millisecond pulsars in M69 and three in M70, including pulsar M69A, which is in a close orbit with a companion star, likely a white dwarf.
• The findings were published in The Astrophysical Journal as part of the international Globular Clusters GMRT Pulsar Search survey involving researchers from India, Germany, the US, and the UK.
• Millisecond pulsars are dense neutron stars that spin hundreds of times per second and serve as natural cosmic clocks to study gravity and stellar evolution.