Abstract
The question of why the observed periods of anomalous X-ray pulsars (AXPs) and soft gamma-ray repeaters (SGRs) cluster in the range 2–12 s is discussed. The possibility that AXPs and SGRs are the descendants of high-mass X-ray binaries that have disintegrated in core-collapse supernova explosions is investigated. The spin periods of neutron stars in high-mass X-ray binaries evolve towards the equilibrium period, which is a few seconds, on average. After the explosion of its massive companion, the neutron star becomes embedded in a dense gaseous envelope, and accretion from this envelope leads to the formation of a residual magnetically levitating disk. It is shown that the expected mass of the disk in this case is 10−7–10−8 M⊙, which is sufficient to support accretion at the rate 1014–1015 g/s over a few thousand years. During this period, the star manifests itself as an isolated X-ray pulsar with a number of parameters similar to those of AXPs and SGRs. The periods of such pulsars can cluster if the lifetime of the residual disk does not exceed the spin-down timescale of the neutron star.
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Original Russian Text © G.S. Bisnovatyi-Kogan, N.R. Ikhsanov, 2015, published in Astronomicheskii Zhurnal, 2015, Vol. 92, No. 6, pp. 462–469.
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Bisnovatyi-Kogan, G.S., Ikhsanov, N.R. Period clustering of anomalous X-ray pulsars. Astron. Rep. 59, 503–509 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1134/S1063772915050017
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1134/S1063772915050017