David Kaplan: "Optical/IR/UV Observations of Isolated Neutron Stars"

David nicely showed how optical/IR/UV observations are providing unique information about neutron star spectral energy distributions and energetics. These objects are hard to observe (B magnitudes of 25-28), but this is still very worthwhile. So far, 6 isolated neutron stars have optical counterparts. Optical/IR/UV have in fact given very strong evidence that INSs are indeed neutron stars. A major outstanding issue is the "optical excess" (X-ray determined blackbody does not fit well at longer wavelengths). Also, it is still unknown whether the optical or UV is pulsed. Can we constrain atmospheric models using these multi-wavelength data?