On September 14, 2015 at 09:50:45 UTC the two detectors of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory simultaneously observed a transient gravitational-wave signal. The signal sweeps upwards in frequency from 35 to 250 Hz with a peak gravitational-wave strain of 1.0×10(-21). It matches the waveform predicted by general relativity for the inspiral and merger of a pair of black holes and the ringdown of the resulting single black hole. The signal was observed with a matched-filter signal-to-noise ratio of 24 and a false alarm rate estimated to be less than 1 event per 203,000 years, equivalent to a significance greater than 5.1σ. The source lies at a luminosity distance of 410(-180)(+160)  Mpc corresponding to a redshift z=0.09(-0.04)(+0.03). In the source frame, the initial black hole masses are 36(-4)(+5)M⊙ and 29(-4)(+4)M⊙, and the final black hole mass is 62(-4)(+4)M⊙, with 3.0(-0.5)(+0.5)M⊙c(2) radiated in gravitational waves. All uncertainties define 90% credible intervals. These observations demonstrate the existence of binary stellar-mass black hole systems. This is the first direct detection of gravitational waves and the first observation of a binary black hole merger.

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The Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger

Gamma-ray bursts (GRB's), short and intense pulses of low-energy $\ensuremath{\gamma}$ rays, have fascinated astronomers and astrophysicists since their unexpected discovery in the late sixties. During the last decade, several space missions---BATSE (Burst and Transient Source Experiment) on the Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory, BeppoSAX and now HETE II (High-Energy Transient Explorer)---together with ground-based optical, infrared, and radio observatories have revolutionized our understanding of GRB's, showing that they are cosmological, that they are accompanied by long-lasting afterglows, and that they are associated with core-collapse supernovae. At the same time a theoretical understanding has emerged in the form of the fireball internal-external shocks model. According to this model GRB's are produced when the kinetic energy of an ultrarelativistic flow is dissipated in internal collisions. The afterglow arises when the flow is slowed down by shocks with the surrounding circumburst matter. This model has had numerous successful predictions, like the predictions of the afterglow itself, of jet breaks in the afterglow light curve, and of the optical flash that accompanies the GRB's. This review focuses on the current theoretical understanding of the physical processes believed to take place in GRB's.

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The physics of gamma-ray bursts

With the successful launch of the Swift Gamma-Ray Burst Explorer, a rich trove of early X-ray afterglow data has been collected by its onboard X-Ray Telescope (XRT). Some interesting features are emerging, including a distinct rapidly decaying component preceding the conventional afterglow component in many sources, a shallow decay component before the more "normal'' decay component observed in a good fraction of GRBs, and X-ray flares in nearly half of the afterglows. In this paper we systematically analyze the possible physical processes that shape the properties of the early X-ray afterglow light curves and use the data to constrain various models. We suggest that the steep decay component is consistent with the tail emission of the prompt gamma-ray bursts and/or the X-ray flares. This provides strong evidence that the prompt emission and afterglow emission are likely two distinct components, supporting the internal origin of the GRB prompt emission. The shallow decay segment observed in a group of GRBs suggests that very likely the forward shock keeps being refreshed for some time. This might be caused by either a long-lived central engine, or a wide distribution of the shell Lorentz factors, or else possibly the deceleration of a Poynting flux-dominated flow. X-ray flares suggest that the GRB central engine is very likely still active after the prompt gamma-ray emission is over, but with a reduced activity at later times. In some cases, the central engine activity even extends to days after the burst triggers. Analyses of early X-ray afterglow data reveal that GRBs are indeed highly relativistic events and that early afterglow data of many bursts, starting from the beginning of the XRT observations, are consistent with the afterglow emission from an ISM environment.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/500723/pdf

Physical Processes Shaping Gamma-Ray Burst X-Ray Afterglow Light Curves: Theoretical Implications from the Swift X-Ray Telescope Observations

The physics of gamma-ray bursts & relativistic jets

We provide a comprehensive review of major developments in our understanding of gamma-ray bursts, with particular focus on the discoveries made within the last fifteen years when their true nature was uncovered. We describe the observational properties of photons from the radio to multi-GeV bands, both in the prompt emission and the afterglow phases. Mechanisms for the generation of these photons in GRBs are discussed and confronted with observations to shed light on the physical properties of these explosions, their progenitor stars and the surrounding medium. After presenting observational evidence that a powerful, collimated, jet moving at close to the speed of light is produced in these explosions, we describe our current understanding regarding the generation, acceleration, and dissipation of the jet and compare these properties with jets associated with AGNs and pulsars. We discuss mounting observational evidence that long duration GRBs are produced when massive stars die, and that at least some short duration bursts are associated with old, roughly solar mass, compact stars. The question of whether a black-hole or a strongly magnetized, rapidly rotating neutron star is produced in these explosions is also discussed. We provide a brief summary of what we have learned about relativistic collisionless shocks and particle acceleration from GRB afterglow studies, and discuss the current understanding of radiation mechanism during the prompt emission phase. We discuss theoretical predictions of possible high-energy neutrino emission from GRBs and the current observational constraints. Finally, we discuss how these explosions may be used to study cosmology, e.g. star formation, metal enrichment, reionization history, as well as the formation of first stars and galaxies in the universe.

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The Physics of Gamma-Ray Bursts and Relativistic Jets

The origin of the ultrahigh-energy (UHE) cosmic rays (CRs) from the second knee ($\ensuremath{\sim}6\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{17}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{eV}$) above in the CR spectrum is still unknown. Recently, there has been growing evidence that a peculiar type of supernovae, called hypernovae, are associated with subenergetic gamma-ray bursts, such as SN1998bw/GRB980425 and SN2003lw/GRB031203. Such hypernovae appear to have high (up to mildly relativistic) velocity ejecta, which may be linked to the subenergetic gamma-ray bursts. Assuming a continuous distribution of the kinetic energy of the hypernova ejecta as a function of its velocity ${E}_{k}\ensuremath{\propto}(\ensuremath{\Gamma}\ensuremath{\beta}{)}^{\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\alpha}}$ with $\ensuremath{\alpha}\ensuremath{\sim}2$, we find that (1) the external shock wave produced by the high-velocity ejecta of a hypernova can accelerate protons up to energies as high as ${10}^{19}\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{eV}$; (2) the cosmological hypernova rate is sufficient to account for the energy flux above the second knee; and (3) the steeper spectrum of CRs at these energies can arise in these sources. In addition, hypernovae would also give rise to a faint diffuse UHE neutrino flux, due to $p\ensuremath{\gamma}$ interactions of the UHE CRs with hypernova optical-UV photons.

High-energy cosmic rays and neutrinos from semirelativistic hypernovae

We derive light curves of the afterglow emission from highly collimated jets if the power-law index (p )o f the electron energy distribution is above 1 but below 2. We find the following: (1) Below the characteristic synchrotron frequency, the light-curve index depends generally on p. (2) As long as the jet expansion is spherical, the light-curve index above the characteristic frequency increases slowly as the spectral index of the emission increases. (3) Once the jet enters the spreading phase, the high-frequency emission flux decays as proportional to rather than proportional to . All these results differ from those in the case of . We compare ( p6)/4 p tt p 1 2 our analytical results with the observations on the GRB 010222 afterglow and conclude that the jet model may be unable to explain the observed data. Thus, a more promising explanation for this afterglow seems to be the expansion of a relativistic fireball or a mildly collimated jet in a dense medium. Subject headings: gamma rays: bursts — relativity — shock waves

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Afterglow Emission from Highly Collimated Jets with Flat Electron Spectra: Application to the GRB 010222 Case?

The increasingly deep limit on the neutrino emission from gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with IceCube observations has reached a level that could place useful constraints on the fireball properties. We first present a revised analytic calculation of the neutrino flux that predicts a flux of one order of magnitude lower than that obtained by the IceCube Collaboration. For the benchmark model parameters (e.g., the bulk Lorentz factor is Γ = 102.5, the observed variability time for the long GRBs is t ob v = 0.01 s, and the ratio between the energy in the accelerated protons and in the radiation is η p = 10 for every burst) in the standard internal shock scenario, the predicted neutrino flux from 215 bursts during the period of the 40- and 59-string configurations is a factor of ~3 below the IceCube sensitivity. However, if we accept the recently found inherent relation between the bulk Lorentz factor and the burst energy, then the expected neutrino flux significantly increases and the spectral peak shifts to a lower energy. In this case, the nondetection implies that the baryon-loading ratio should be η p 10 if the variability time of the long GRBs is fixed to t ob v = 0.01 s. Instead, if we relax the standard internal-shock scenario but still assume η p = 10, then the nondetection constrains the dissipation radius, R 4 × 1012 cm, assuming the same dissipation radius for every burst and benchmark parameters for the fireballs. We also calculate the diffuse neutrino flux from the GRBs for different luminosity functions from the literature. The expected flux exceeds the current IceCube limit for some of the luminosity functions, and, thus, the nondetection constrains η p 10 when the variability time of the long GRBs is fixed at t ob v = 0.01 s.

Icecube nondetection of gamma-ray bursts: constraints on the fireball properties

Fermi observations of high-energy gamma-ray emission from GRB 080916C shows that its spectrum is consistent with the band function from MeV to tens of GeV. Assuming one single emission mechanism dominates in the whole energy range, we show that this spectrum is consistent with synchrotron origin by shock-accelerated electrons. The simple electron inverse-Compton model and the hadronic model are found to be less viable. In the synchrotron scenario, the synchrotron self-Compton scattering is likely to be in the Klein-Nishina (KN) regime and therefore the resulting high-energy emission is subdominant, even though the magnetic field energy density is lower than that in relativistic electrons. The KN inverse-Compton cooling may also affect the low-energy electron number distribution and hence results in a low-energy synchrotron photon spectrum n(ν) ∝ ν–1 below the peak energy. Under the framework of the electron synchrotron interpretation, we constrain the shock microphysical parameters and derive a lower limit of the upstream magnetic fields. The detection of synchrotron emission extending to about 70 GeV in the source frame in GRB 080916C favors the Bohm diffusive shock acceleration if the bulk Lorentz factor of the relativistic outflow is not significantly greater than thousands.

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0004-637X/698/2/L98/pdf

GRB 080916C: On the Radiation Origin of the Prompt Emission from keV/MeV TO GeV

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are radio bursts characterized by millisecond durations, high Galactic latitude positions, and high dispersion measures. Very recently, the cosmological origin of FRB 150418 has been confirmed by Keane et al., and FRBs are now strong competitors as cosmological probes. The simple sharp feature of the FRB signal is ideal to probe some of the fundamental laws of physics. Here we show that by analyzing the delay time between different frequencies, the FRB data can place stringent upper limits on the rest mass of the photon. For FRB 150418 at z = 0.492, one can potentially reach m(gamma) <= 5.2 10(-47) g, which is 10(20) times smaller than the rest mass of electron and is about 10(3) times smaller than that obtained using other astrophysical sources with the same method.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8205/822/1/L15/pdf

Z. G. Dai

Papers

High-energy cosmic rays and neutrinos from semirelativistic hypernovae

Afterglow Emission from Highly Collimated Jets with Flat Electron Spectra: Application to the GRB 010222 Case?

Icecube nondetection of gamma-ray bursts: constraints on the fireball properties

GRB 080916C: On the Radiation Origin of the Prompt Emission from keV/MeV TO GeV

Constraints on the photon mass with fast radio bursts