Effects of Rotation and Relativistic Charge Flow on Pulsar Magnetospheric Structure

We propose an analytical 3-D model of the open field-line region of a neutronstar (NS) magnetosphere. We construct an explicit analytic solution forarbitrary obliquity (angle between the rotation and magnetic axes)incorporating the effects of magnetospheric rotation, relativistic flow ofcharges (e.g. primary electron beam) along the open field lines, and E X Bdrift of these charges. Our solution employs the space-charge-limitedlongitudinal current calculated in the electrodynamic model of Muslimov &Tsygan (1992) and is valid up to very high altitudes nearly approaching thelight cylinder. We assume that in the innermost magnetosphere, the NS magneticfield can be well represented by a static magnetic dipole configuration. Athigh altitudes the open magnetic field lines significantly deviate from thoseof a static dipole and tend to focus into a cylindrical bundle, swept back inthe direction opposite to the rotation, and also bent towards the rotationalequator. We briefly discuss some implications of our study to spin-poweredpulsars.Comment: 24 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in Ap