Thermal Field Growth In Neutron Stars: An Alternative To 'Injection'?

Analyses of the statistics of pulsars and of pulsar-produced nebulae have, over the past several years, led to the conclusion that most pulsars are born spinning rather slowly, with periods in excess of 100 ms. In this note we examine whether a slow build-up of neutron star magnetic fields from very low initial values (~108 gauss) may provide a viable alternative to this, as has been suggested by some authors. We find that irrespective of whether the field grows or not, slow rotation of neutron stars at birth remains an inevitable conclusion.