DEPOLARIZATION AND POSITION ANGLE JUMPS DUE TO RELATIVE LONGITUDE SHIFT OF PULSAR BEAMS

Pulsar radio emission is generally found to be linearly polarized over all longitudes of profiles, some times as high as up to 100%. The pos ition angle sweep is in an 'S' shape, which can be well understood wit hin the rotating vector model (Radhakrishnan & Cooke 1969). However, d epolarization and position angle jumping are often found in the integr ated profiles of some pulsars. In this paper, we investigate the effec t on polarization behaviour due to relative phase shift between pulsar beam components caused by retardation effect, considering that the co re and conal emission components are radiated from different heights. We conclude that the phase shift of beam centers of the different comp onents could cause the depolarization and position angle jump(s) in in tegrated profiles.