The Swift satellite lives up to its name, revealing cosmic explosions as they happen

Starling, R. L. C.

doi:10.1098/rsta.2008.0153

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

2008

DOI: 10.1098/rsta.2008.0153

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The Swift satellite lives up to its name, revealing cosmic explosions as they happen

R. L. C. Starling

Abstract: Gamma-ray bursts are the most powerful objects in the Universe. Discovered in the 1960s as brief flashes of gamma radiation, we now know that they emit across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, are located in distant galaxies and comprise two distinct populations, one of which may originate in the deaths of massive stars. The launch of the Swift satellite in 2004 brought a flurry of new discoveries, advancing our understanding of these sources and the galaxies that host them. I highlight a number of importan… Show more

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“…Discovered in the 1960s as brief flashes of gamma radiation, they originate in distant galaxies and comprise two distinct populations, one of which may arise from the supernovae deaths of massive stars. Starling (2008) describes how the launch of the Swift satellite in 2004 has brought a flurry of new discoveries that have advanced our understanding of the sources and the galaxies in which they lie. She highlights, in particular, a number of key results already gleaned from the Swift era.…”

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Introduction. Progress in astronomy: from gravitational waves to space weather

Thompson

2008

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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This brief paper introduces and reviews the 'visions of the future' articles prepared by leading young scientists throughout the world for the first of two Christmas 2008 Triennial issues of Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A, devoted, respectively, to astronomy and Earth science. Contributions in astronomy include the very topical gamma-ray bursts, new ideas on stellar collapse and the unusual atmospheres of synchronized planets orbiting nearby stars.Keywords: black holes; gravitational waves; gamma-ray bursts; stellar collapse; supernovae; extrasolar planetsThe collection of articles by young researchers for Christmas 2008 is devoted, by virtue of the triennial cycling (table 1) through the physical sciences established in 2002, to astronomy and Earth science. These are now spread between two issues of Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A to reflect the higher frequency of the journal, which stepped up from 12 to 24 issues per year in January 2008. The present introductory paper relates to the first of these two issues devoted to astronomy. Here, the first two papers are at the cosmic end of the size scale. In the first paper, Gair (2008) describes how researchers should soon be able to detect gravitational waves for the first time, opening up new horizons in astronomy. These waves, predicted by Einstein's General Theory of Relativity should be observable with a new generation of laser interferometers, some of which are already in operation. Astronomers will then be able to probe some of the most exotic and energetic events in the Universe associated with the merging of black holes, and make very precise checks on the theory of relativity in a new physical arena. In the second paper, Baugh (2008) explains how cosmologists regularly generate synthetic universes of galaxies using computer simulations, and discusses the different physical processes that the models must attempt to mirror. The results facilitate the analysis and exploitation of real galaxy surveys.The next three papers are devoted to gamma-ray bursts and high-energy cosmic rays. The gamma-ray bursts are the most energetic explosions in the Universe, occurring at cosmological distances. Discovered in the 1960s as brief

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Introduction. Progress in astronomy: from gravitational waves to space weather

Thompson

2008

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A.

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Gamma-ray burst afterglow blast waves

Eerten

2018

Int. J. Mod. Phys. D

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The various stages of baryonic gamma-ray burst afterglow blast waves are reviewed. These are responsible for the afterglow emission from which much of our understanding of gamma-ray bursts derives. Initially, the blast waves are confined to the dense medium surrounding the burster (stellar envelope or dense wind), giving rise to a jet-cocoon structure. A massive ejecta is released and potentially fed by ongoing energy release from the burster and a forward-reverse shock system is set up between ejecta and ambient density. Ultimately the blast wave spreads sideways and slows down, and the dominant afterglow emission shifts from X-rays down to radio. Over the past years significant progress has been made both observationally and theoretically/numerically in our understanding of these blast waves, unique in the universe due to their often incredibly high initial Lorentz factors of 100-1000. The recent discovery of a short gamma-ray burst counterpart to a gravitational wave detection (GW 170817) brings the promise of a completely new avenue to explore and constrain the dynamics of gamma-ray burst blast waves. January 8, 2018 1:34 WSPC/INSTRUCTION FILE vanEerten˙IJMPD˙review-arXiv 2 Hendrik van EertenWhat ultimately tipped the scales firmly in favor of extra-galactic models involving cataclysmic events produced by individual or merging stars, were the 1997 discoveries of afterglows and the redshift distance determinations that these made possible. 4, 5 GRB afterglows had been predicted by a class of models (most explicitly, the fireball model 6, 7 ) positing a sudden deposition of a huge amount of energy at the site of a neutron star merger or massive star collapse. This was argued to trigger an expanding relativistic blast wave, which would ultimately decelerate and produce counterpart emission at a range of frequencies (i.e. X-rays and optical, 8 radio 9 ), as the energies of shock-accelerated particles in the blast wave shifted to lower peak values. The far smaller directional error circles from afterglow X-ray and optical measurements relative to gamma rays made the first host galaxy association 10, 11 possible (GRB 970228), at which point the verdict was unambiguously in.The first detected afterglow was connected to a long GRB. It had already become clear that there existed a bimodality in the distribution of GRB durations, with separate long and short duration populations on either side of a divide at roughly 2 seconds. 12 The aforementioned host galaxy association of GRB 970228 and in particular the measurement of a supernova (SN) counterpart to nearby (uniquely so, at z = 0.0085) GRB 980425, 13 firmly established a massive star origin for the long GRBs. The predominant model for short GRBs is that these are launched during the merger of two neutron stars. 14,15 Until very recently, the peer-reviewed evidence for the short GRB scenario remained indirect, and was based on e.g. time-scale arguments, host galaxy types and measured offsets relative to host galaxies (for a recent review, see e.g. 16 ). However, shor...

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The Swift satellite lives up to its name, revealing cosmic explosions as they happen

Cited by 2 publications

References 41 publications

Introduction. Progress in astronomy: from gravitational waves to space weather

Introduction. Progress in astronomy: from gravitational waves to space weather

Gamma-ray burst afterglow blast waves

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