Gamma-Ray Pulsars with the GLAST Large Area Telescope

International audienceThe Large Area Telescope (LAT) on the Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) will see first light in mid-2008, and is expected to discover scores of pulsars in GeV γ-rays. For most, days to weeks will separate recorded gamma events. Rotation parameters provided by radio or X-ray instruments permit pulsation searches with greater sensitivity than what the LAT can achieve alone. But the gamma pulsar candidates tend to be the young ones with large timing noise, meaning that the ephemerides need to be updated relatively frequently over the years of the GLAST mission. We describe the criteria used to identify gamma pulsar candidates, and the observation campaign underway to provide ephemerides useful for the pulsed gamma searches, with some illustrations of the LAT's capabilities