Radio detection prospects for a bulge population of millisecond pulsars as suggested by Fermi LAT observations of the inner Galaxy

Understand

Analogously to globular clusters, the dense stellar environment of the Galactic center has been proposed to host a large population of as-yet undetected millisecond pulsars (MSPs).

• Recently, this hypothesis found support in the analysis of gamma rays from the inner Galaxy seen by the Large Area Telescope (LAT) aboard the Fermi satellite, which revealed a possible excess of diffuse GeV photons in the inner 15 deg about the Galactic center (Fermi GeV excess).
• The excess can be interpreted as the collective emission of thousands of MSPs in the Galactic bulge, with a spherical distribution that strongly peaks towards the Galactic center.
• In order to fully establish the MSP interpretation, it is essential to find corroborating evidence in multi-wavelength searches, most notably through the detection of radio pulsation from individual bulge MSPs.