B0329+54
Pulsar
PSR B0329+54
The brightest pulsar in the northern sky, and the one we use to prove the receiver is awake.
02 / 06
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{Each line = one pulse}
- Catalogue
- PSR B0329+54
- Type
- Pulsar
- We listen at
- 408.000 MHz
- Period
- 0.7145 s
- Distance
- ≈ 3,400 light-years
- Discovered
- 1968
- By
- Cambridge, a year after CP 1919
- Position
- 03h 32m 59.4s
+54° 34′ 44″ - From Stilledal
- Circumpolar. High in the north all night.
Every Listening Night starts here. B0329+54 is so strong that a clean profile appears within a minute, which makes it the observatory's tuning fork.
Its pulse has three parts, a shoulder, a peak and a shoulder, and every so often it switches to a different shape for a few minutes and back. Astronomers call this mode changing.
Guests usually ask whether it is alive. It is not. It is only very, very regular.
{What it sounds like}
A heartbeat, a little faster than yours.
{Headphones help. The sound is synthesized from the real period and profile.}
{Next station/} 03 / 06 · 1400.000 MHz
The Crab