The extreme physics of spider pulsar binaries

双星脉冲星是一个强大的实验室，由于它们的极端性质（密度、磁场和引力场），使我们能够研究基础物理学。这是唯一可能的，因为它们提供了通过多波长观测来测量其物理参数的代理。特别重要的是脉冲星双星，它们以致命的蜘蛛“黑寡妇”和“红背”命名，其中包含一颗快速旋转的毫秒脉冲星，它会逐渐摧毁一颗低质量的伴星。目前的观测表明，这些特殊的系统中蕴藏着一些我们已知的旋转速度最快、质量最大的脉冲星。该博士生将参与导师的“蜘蛛团队”领导的几个项目，该项目旨在发现和描述新的蜘蛛，以了解其非凡特性的潜在物理机制。在观测方面，蜘蛛团队参与了在光学和无线电波长上进行的多种脉冲星搜索工作，例如TRAPUM与MeerKAT望远镜合作进行的调查。然后对电磁波谱上已知系统进行深入研究，以便为模型提供信息，使我们能够确定系统参数，如轨道倾角、质量等。在理论方面，双星演化的数值模拟是另一个活跃的研究领域，它提供了导致脉冲星逐渐摧毁其伴星的极端相互作用的见解。博士项目的首要目标将是阐明脉冲星对伴星演化的影响。他们将应用尖端的数据科学技术（例如统计推断，处理大型数据集和高性能计算）到上面强调的一些领域，以提取二进制交互的信息。

Binary pulsars are formidable laboratories, allowing us to investigate fundamental physics due to their extreme nature (density, magnetic field and gravitational field). This is only possible as they offer proxies to measure their physical parameters via multi-wavelength observations. Of particular importance are the pulsar binaries nicknamed after the deadly spiders 'black widows' and 'redbacks', which contain a rapidly rotating millisecond pulsar that gradually destroys a low-mass companion. Current observations demonstrate that these particular systems harbour some of the most rapidly spinning and massive pulsars known to us. The PhD student will contribute to several projects led by the supervisor's "Spiders team" which aim to find and characterise new spiders to understand the underlying physical mechanisms to their remarkable properties. On the observational side, the Spiders team is involved with multiple pulsar searching efforts conducted at optical and radio wavelengths such as surveys conducted by the TRAPUM collaboration with the MeerKAT telescope. In-depth studies of known systems across the electromagnetic spectrum are then performed in order to feed into models that enable us to determine system parameters such as orbital inclination, masses, and more. On the theoretical side, numerically modelling of the binary evolution is another active area of investigation which offers insights about the extreme interactions which led the pulsar to gradually destroy its companion.The overarching goal of the PhD project will be to shed light on the impact of the pulsar on the companion's evolution. They will apply cutting-edge data science techniques (e.g. statistical inference, processing large datasets and high performance computing) to some of the areas highlighted above to extract information on the binary interaction.