Astron. Astrophys. 343, L5-L8 (1999)

Letter to the Editor

Optical observations of PSR1706-44 with the test camera of the VLT-UT1 ^*

R.P. Mignani ¹, P.A. Caraveo ^2,3 and G.F. Bignami <sup>4,5

1</sup> STECF, Karl Schwarzschild Strasse 2, D-85740 Garching, Germany (rmignani@eso.org)
² Istituto di Fisica Cosmica del CNR, Via Bassini 15, I-20133 Milan, Italy (pat@ifctr.mi.cnr.it)
³ Istituto Astronomico, Via Lancisi 29, I-00161 Rome, Italy
⁴ Agenzia Spaziale Italiana, Via di Villa Patrizi 13, I-00161 Rome, Italy (bignami@asi.it)
⁵ Universitá di Pavia, Via Bassi 6, I-27100 Pavia, Italy

Received 12 October 1998 / Accepted 11 November 1998

Abstract

We report on the optical observations of the -ray pulsar PSR1706-44 performed with the Test Camera of the VLT-UT1 during the telescope Science Verification programme. With a limiting magnitude of , these are the deepest optical observations ever performed for this pulsar, for which, however, no likely counterpart has been detected. The non-detection of PSR1706-44 sets an upper limit on its optical luminosity varying from to erg s^-1, depending on the exact amount of interstellar absorption.

Key words: stars: pulsars: individual: PSR1706-4 instrumentation: detectors telescopes

* Based on observations collected at the European Southern Observatory, Paranal, Chile (VLT-UT1 Science Verification Program)

Send offprint requests to: R.P. Mignani

SIMBAD Objects

Contents

• 1. Introduction
• 2. Observations
  • 2.1. Data reduction
  • 2.2. Results
• 3. Conclusions
• Acknowledgements
• References

© European Southern Observatory (ESO) 1999

Online publication: March 1, 1999
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