IGR J17062–6143 Is an Accreting Millisecond X-Ray Pulsar

Abstract

We present the discovery of 163.65 Hz X-ray pulsations from IGR J17062−6143 in the only observation obtained from the source with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer . This detection makes IGR J17062−6143 the lowest-frequency accreting millisecond X-ray pulsar presently known. The pulsations are detected in the 2–12 keV band with an overall significance of 4.3 σ and an observed pulsed amplitude of 5.54% ± 0.67% (in this band). Both dynamic power spectral and coherent phase timing analysis indicate that the pulsation frequency is decreasing during the ≈1.2 ks observation in a manner consistent with orbital motion of the neutron star. Because the observation interval is short, we cannot precisely measure the orbital period; however, periods shorter than 17 minutes are excluded at 90% confidence. For the range of acceptable circular orbits the inferred binary mass function substantially overlaps the observed range for the AMXP population as a whole.