Unexpected Windy Weather Around a Highly Magnetized Neutron Star

Magnetars and rotation-powered pulsars (RPPs) historically represented two distinct subclasses of neutron stars. Magnetars are slowly-rotating (~2-12 s), isolated neutron stars (NSs) with super-strong magnetic fields, B~10^13-10^15 G. RPPs, on the other hand, are rapidly-rotating (~0.01-0.3~s), isolated NSs with surface dipole magnetic field in the range ~10^11-10^13 G. Most pulsars possess a large rotational energy loss rate that powers a relativistic magnetized particle wind, often seen as a pulsar wind nebula (PWN; the Crab PWN being the most famous). There has not yet been convincing evidence for a wind nebula around magnetars, most likely due to their low rotational energy loss rate. Here, we report the study of new deep X-ray observations of the peculiar extended emission around the magnetar Swift J1834.9-0846. Our new results strongly support a wind nebula as the nature of the extended emission, thus, establishing Swift J1834.9-0846 as the first magnetar to possess a surrounding nebula. This implies that wind nebulae are no longer exclusive to RPPs and, along with recent discoveries in the field, further narrow the gaps between these two sub-populations of isolated NSs. The physical properties of this wind nebula, however, show peculiarities, especially its high radiative efficiency of about 10%, only shared with two other known very young RPPs, the Crab and its twin.