The spinning neutron star produces beams of radiation that sweep across your line of sight like a lighthouse beam does for ships at sea. In the lighthouse model the neutron star's strong magnetic field creates a strong electric field. The electric field makes charged particles (mostly electrons) flow out of the magnetic poles. As the charged particles spiral around the magnetic field lines, they produce electromagnetic radiation (recall from the electromagnetic radiation chapter that any moving charge will create electromagnetic radiation). The energy is called non-thermal radiation because it is not produced by a hot, dense object, but by accelerated charges. The shape of the continuous spectrum is different from a normal thermal spectrum and does not depend on the temperature. A type of particle accelerator in physics laboratories here on Earth called a ``synchroton'' produces this kind of radiation too, so it is sometimes called ``synchrotron radiation''. (read more...)
