Spectra of southern pulsars

We compare the spectral properties of the millisecond and slow pulsars dete cted in the Parkes 70 cm survey. The mean spectral index for the millisecon d pulsars (MSPs) is - 1.9 +/- 0.1, whereas the mean spectral index for the slow pulsars is a surprisingly steep: 1.72 +/- 0.04. A Kolmogorov-Smirnov t est indicates that there is only a 72% probability that the two distributio ns differ. As a class, MSPs are therefore only fractionally steeper spectru m objects than slow pulsars, as recent literature would suggest. We then mo del the expected distribution of MSPs in the Galaxy and find that high-freq uency surveys, with sensitivities similar to the current Parkes multibeam s urvey, are likely to detect MSPs in large numbers. The observed distributio n of MSPs will be much less isotropic than that resulting from low-frequenc y surveys, with 50% of detectable MSPs residing within 11 degrees of the Ga lactic plane In an all-sky survey.