Fundamental Physics with Spider Pulsars

The PhD student will contribute to several projects led by the supervisor's team which aim to find and characterise new spider pulsars and understand the mechanisms responsible for their remarkable properties. One area of investigation is a radio survey to find energetic pulsars with the new MeerKAT telescope array. Set to start in early 2020, this campaign is expected to nearly double the number of known spider population. The PhD student will help develop new analysis techniques which will take advantage of multi-wavelength datasets including optical light curves to improve the performances of the survey as well as undertake initial follow-up work. A second area of investigation is the modelling of the interaction between the pulsar and its companion, mainly via numerical simulations, to explain the binary evolution and physical properties of these systems.