Speaker
Description
Over the past decade, the legacy and MWAX VCS systems have enabled a wealth of pulsar and fast transient (PFT) science, culminating in the SMART survey project, an all-sky survey for pulsars and fast transients in the low-frequency southern skies. As we enter the Phase III era, the advent of real-time beamforming brings several new and exciting science opportunities. It will enable timing follow-up of new pulsars discovered by the SMART and will facilitate impactful contributions to high-profile projects such as pulsar timing array (PTA) experiments. A well-tested beamformer will also enable numerous other science projects that were not feasible in the VCS era, such as in-depth investigation of pulsar emission physics using long time series data sets, sensitive targeted searches for millisecond pulsars, routine observations to characterise new pulsars and long period transients, and even monitoring repeating FRBs during the episodes of hyperactivity. Realising all these however requires a systematic science commissioning and verification exercise, so a high priority activity for the PFT group. I will briefly outline the plans for the near term including early science projects, as well as some longer-term projects centred around PTA and ISM science that will benefit from a multi-year pulsar monitoring program that takes advantage of both the Phase III upgrade and MWAX’s beamforming capabilities.
| Timeslot preferences | ~20 min would be great. If possible please schedule before mid-night AWST. |
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