XRISM Catches a Pulsar’s Cosmic Wind…and Sees a Surprising Result

The Universe is a strange place. The X-Ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission (XRISM) orbiting observatory recently highlighted this fact, when it was turned on a pulsar to document its powerful cosmic winds.
The discovery comes courtesy of ESA’s Resolve instrument, a soft X-ray spectrometer aboard XRISM. The study looked at neutron star GX 13+1. This is a strong X-ray source located in the constellation Sagittarius, very near the galactic plane towards the core of our galaxy. GX 13+1 is about 23,000 light-years distant.