The evolution of core and surface magnetic field in isolated neutron stars

Abstract

We apply the model of flux expulsion from the superfluid and superconductive core of a neutron star, developed by Konenkov & Geppert (2000), both to neutron star models based on different equations of state and to different initial magnetic field structures. When initially the core and the surface magnetic field are of the same order of magnitude, the rate of flux expulsion from the core is almost independent of the equation of state, and the evolution of the surface field decouples from the core field evolution with increasing stiffness. When the surface field is initially much stronger than the core field, the magnetic and rotational evolution resembles to those of a neutron star with a purely crustal field configuration; the only difference is the occurence of a residual field. In case of an initially submerged field significant differences from the standard evolution occur only during the early period of neutron star's life, until the field has been rediffused to the surface. The reminder of the episode of submergence is a correlation of the residual field strength with the submergence depth of the initial field. We discuss the effect of the rediffusion of the magnetic field on to the difference between the real and the active age of young pulsars and on their braking indices. Finally, we estimate the shear stresses built up by the moving fluxoids at the crust--core interface and show that preferentially in neutron stars with a soft equation of state these stresses may cause crust cracking.