Is the Enigma of Pulsar Radio Emission Solved?

An intriguing paper has recently been published claiming that the long-sought Rosetta Stone needed to decipher the nature of pulsar radio emission has been finally identified as the bifurcated features in averaged pulsar profiles The authors argued that highly symmetric bifurcated features observed in PSR J1012+5307 and other pulsars are produced by a split-fan beams of extraordinary-mode curvature radiation emitted by thin streams of sources conducted by a very narrow bundles of magnetic field lines. We examined the arguments leading to such a profound conclusion and found at least one fatal flaw. Using an elementary pulsar physics we showed that there is not enough energy to power the bifurcated feature in J1012+5307 within a split-fan beams model. If the source streams are indeed so thin that their emission can reveal the signatures of elementary radiation mechanism, then the energy deficit reaches several orders of magnitude.