A Tale of Two Populations: Rotating Radio Transients and X-ray Dim Isolated Neutron Stars

We highlight similarities between recently discovered rotating radio transients and X-ray dim isolated neutron stars. In particular, it is shown that X-ray dim isolated neutron stars have a birthrate comparable to that of rotating radio transients. On the contrary, magnetars have a formation rate that is too low to account for the bulk of the radio transient population. The consequences of the recent detection of a thermal X-ray source associated with one of the rotating radio transients on the proposed scenarios for these sources are also discussed.