• DOI:10.1088/0004-637X/781/1/13
• Corpus ID: 24657235

A NEW POPULATION OF ULTRA-LONG DURATION GAMMA-RAY BURSTS

@article{Levan2013ANP,
  title={A NEW POPULATION OF ULTRA-LONG DURATION GAMMA-RAY BURSTS},
  author={Andrew J. Levan and Nial R. Tanvir and R L C Starling and Klaas Wiersema and Kim L. Page and Daniel A. Perley and Steve Schulze and Graham A. Wynn and Ryan Chornock and Jens Hjorth and S. Bradley Cenko and Andrew S. Fruchter and P. T. O’Brien and G. C. Brown and Rachel L. Tunnicliffe and Daniele B. Malesani and P. Jakobsson and Darach Watson and Edo Berger and David Bersier and B. E. Cobb and Stefano Covino and A. Cucchiara and Antonio de Ugarte Postigo and Derek B. Fox and Avishay Gal-yam and Paolo Goldoni and Javier Gorosabel and Lex Kaper and Thomas Kruehler and Raine Karjalainen and Julian P. Osborne and Elena Pian and R. S{\'a}nchez-Ram{\'i}rez and Brian Schmidt and Ian Skillen and Gianpiero Tagliaferri and Christina C. Th{\"o}ne and Ovidiu Văduvescu and R. A. M. J. Wijers and B. Ashley Zauderer},
  journal={The Astrophysical Journal},
  year={2013},
  volume={781}
}

• A. Levan, N. Tanvir, +38 authors B. Zauderer
• Published 10 February 2013
• Physics
• The Astrophysical Journal

We present comprehensive multiwavelength observations of three gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with durations of several thousand seconds. We demonstrate that these events are extragalactic transients; in particular, we resolve the long-standing conundrum of the distance of GRB 101225A (the “Christmas-day burst”), finding it to have a redshift z = 0.847 and showing that two apparently similar events (GRB 111209A and GRB 121027A) lie at z = 0.677 and z = 1.773, respectively. The systems show extremely unusual X-ray and optical light curves, very different from classical GRBs, with long-lasting, highly variable X-ray emission and optical light curves that exhibit little correlation with the behavior seen in the X-ray. Their host galaxies are faint, compact, and highly star-forming dwarf galaxies, typical of “blue compact galaxies.” We propose that these bursts are the prototypes of a hitherto largely unrecognized population of ultra-long GRBs, which while observationally difficult to detect may be astrophysically relatively common. The long durations may naturally be explained by the engine-driven explosions of stars of much larger radii than normally considered for GRB progenitors, which are thought to have compact Wolf–Rayet progenitor stars. However, we cannot unambiguously identify supernova signatures within their light curves or spectra. We also consider the alternative possibility that they arise from the tidal disruption of stars by massive black holes and conclude that the associated timescales are only consistent with the disruption of compact stars (e.g., white dwarfs) by black holes of relatively low mass (<105 M☉).