The 2022 High-energy Outburst and Radio Disappearing Act of the Magnetar 1E 1547.0–5408

Abstract

We report the radio and high-energy properties of a new outburst from the radio-loud magnetar 1E 1547.0−5408. Following the detection of a short burst from the source with Swift-BAT on 2022 April 7, observations by NICER detected an increased flux peaking at (6.0 ± 0.4) × 10 ^−11 erg s ^−1 cm ^−2 in the soft X-ray band, falling to a baseline level of 1.7 × 10 ^−11 erg s ^−1 cm ^−2 over a 17 day period. Joint spectroscopic measurements by NICER and NuSTAR indicated no change in the hard nonthermal tail despite the prominent increase in soft X-rays. Observations at radio wavelengths with Murriyang, the 64 m Parkes radio telescope, revealed that the persistent radio emission from the magnetar disappeared at least 22 days prior to the initial Swift-BAT detection and was redetected two weeks later. Such behavior is unprecedented in a radio-loud magnetar, and may point to an unnoticed slow rise in the high-energy activity prior to the detected short bursts. Finally, our combined radio and X-ray timing revealed the outburst coincided with a spin-up glitch, where the spin frequency and spin-down rate increased by 0.2 ± 0.1 μ Hz and (−2.4 ± 0.1) × 10 ^−12 s ^−2 , respectively. A linear increase in the spin-down rate of (−2.0 ± 0.1) × 10 ^−19 s ^−3 was also observed over 147 days of postoutburst timing. Our results suggest that the outburst may have been associated with a reconfiguration of the quasi-polar field lines, likely signaling a changing twist, accompanied by spatially broader heating of the surface and a brief quenching of the radio signal, yet without any measurable impact on the hard X-ray properties.

Keywords

• Magnetars
• Pulsars
• Radio pulsars
• High energy astrophysics
• Neutron stars