Our work clearly shows that the GRB had a unique structure, with observations gradually revealing a narrow jet embedded within a wider gas outflow where an isolated jet would normally be expected.”
“The slow fade of the afterglow is not characteristic of a narrow jet of gas, and knowing this made us suspect there was an additional reason for the intensity of the explosion, and our mathematical models have borne this out. Van Eerten, who co-led the theoretical analysis of the afterglow, said: “Other researchers working on this puzzle have also come to the conclusion that the jet was pointed directly at us-much like a garden hose angled to spray straight at you-and this definitely goes some way to explain why it was seen so brightly.īut what remained a puzzle was that the edges of the jet could not be seen at all. Brendan O’Connor, a newly graduated doctoral student at the University of Maryland and George Washington University in Washington, DC is the study’s lead author. The team’s findings are published today in the prestigious journal Science Advances. Hendrik Van Eerten from the Department of Physics at the University of Bath in the UK has formulated an explanation: the initial burst (known as GRB 221009A) was angled directly at Earth and it also dragged along an unusually large amount of stellar material in its wake. Now an international team that includes Dr. Since picking up the BOAT signal simultaneously on their giant telescopes, astrophysicists the world over have been scrambling to account for the brightness of the gamma-ray burst (GRB) and the curiously slow fade of its afterglow. The event, produced by the collapse of a highly massive star and the subsequent birth of a black hole, was witnessed as an immensely bright flash of gamma rays followed by a slow-fading afterglow of light across frequencies. Few cosmic explosions have attracted as much attention from space scientists as the one recorded on October 22 last year and aptly named the Brightest of All Time (BOAT).
0 kommentar(er)
