Long Gamma-Ray Bursts Can Be Generated by Neutron Star Mergers For nearly two decades, astrophysicists have believed that long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) resulted solely from the collapse of massive stars. Now, a new study upends that long-established and long-accepted belief. Led by Northwestern
Artist’s impression of GRB 211211A. The kilonova and gamma-ray burst is on the right. The blue color represents material squeezed along the poles, while the red colors indicate material ejected by the two inspiralling neutron stars that is now swirling around the merged object. A disk of ejecta emitted after the merger, hidden behind the red and blue ejecta, is shown in purple. A fast jet of material punches through the kilonova cloud.
Fong is an assistant professor of physics and astronomy in Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a key member of the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics . Rastinejad, a Ph.D. student in astronomy and member of Fong’s research group, is the paper’s first author., GRBs are divided into two classes. GRBs with durations less than two seconds are considered short GRBs. If a GRB is longer than two seconds, then it’s considered a long GRB.
“The weather was worsening in Hawaii, and we were so disappointed because we were starting to uncover hints that this burst was unlike anything we had seen before,” she said. “Luckily, Northwestern provides us with remote access to the MMT Observatory in Arizona, and an ideal instrument was being put on that telescope the next day. It was cloudy there, but the telescope operators knew how important this burst was and found a gap between the clouds to take our images.
“When you put two neutron stars together, there’s not really much mass there,” Fong explained. “A little bit of mass accretes and then powers a very short-duration burst. In the case of massive star collapses, which traditionally power longer gamma-ray bursts, there is a longer feeding time.”The event wasn’t the only strange part of the study. The GRB’s host galaxy also is quite curious. Named SDSS J140910.47+275320.
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