An Extremely Luminous Panchromatic Outburst from the Nucleus of a Distant Galaxy

@article{Levan2011AnEL,
  title={An Extremely Luminous Panchromatic Outburst from the Nucleus of a Distant Galaxy},
  author={Andrew J. Levan and Nial R. Tanvir and S. Bradley Cenko and Daniel A. Perley and K. Wiersema and Joshua S. Bloom and A. S. Fruchter and Antonio de Ugarte Postigo and P. T. O’Brien and N. R. Butler and Alexander J. van der Horst and Giorgos Leloudas and Adam N. Morgan and Kuntal Misra and Geoffrey C. Bower and Jay Farihi and Rachel L. Tunnicliffe and Maryam Modjaz and Jeffrey M Silverman and Jens Hjorth and Christina C. Th{\"o}ne and A. Cucchiara and Jose Maria Castro Ceron and Alberto J. Castro-Tirado and Jacob A. Arnold and Michael Bremer and Jean P. Brodie and T. C. Carroll and Michael C. Cooper and Peter A. Curran and Roc M. Cutri and John Ehle and Duncan A Forbes and Johan P. U. Fynbo and Javier Gorosabel and John F. Graham and Douglas I. Hoffman and Sergei S. Guziy and P. Jakobsson and Atish Kamble and Tom H. Kerr and Mansi M. Kasliwal and Chryssa Kouveliotou and D. Kocevski and Nicholas M. Law and Peter E. Nugent and Eran O. Ofek and Dovi Poznanski and Robert M. Quimby and Evert Rol and Aaron J. Romanowsky and Roberto Sanchez-Ramirez and Steve Schulze and N. Singh and L van Spaandonk and Rhaana L. C. Starling and Richard G. Strom and J. C. Tello and Ovidiu Văduvescu and Peter J. Wheatley and Ralph A. M. J. Wijers and Jack M. Winters and D. W. Xu},
  journal={Science},
  year={2011},
  volume={333},
  pages={199 - 202}
}
A recent bright emission observed by the Swift satellite is due to the sudden accretion of a star onto a massive black hole. Variable x-ray and γ-ray emission is characteristic of the most extreme physical processes in the universe. We present multiwavelength observations of a unique γ-ray–selected transient detected by the Swift satellite, accompanied by bright emission across the electromagnetic spectrum, and whose properties are unlike any previously observed source. We pinpoint the event to… Expand
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An Extremely Luminous Outburst from a Relativistic Tidal Disruption Event
  • A. Levan
  • Physics
  • Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union
  • 2011
Abstract We present the discovery and monitoring observations of Swift 1644+57, a luminous outburst from the nucleus of a galaxy at z = 0.35. Precise astrometry ties the source to within a few… Expand
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Observations of a bright X-ray flare from the extragalactic transient Swift J164449.3+573451 conclude that they have captured the onset of relativistic jet activity from a supermassive black hole. Expand
Swift 1644+57: The Longest Gamma-ray Burst?
Swift recently discovered an unusual gamma-ray and x-ray transient (Sw 1644+57) that was initially identified as a long-duration gamma-ray burst (GRB). However, the 10 keV x-ray emission has… Expand
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Observations suggest a sudden accretion event onto a central MBH of mass about 106 to 107 solar masses, which leads to a natural analogy of Sw 1644+57 to a temporary smaller-scale blazar. Expand
Relativistic tidal disruption events
In March 2011 Swift detected an extremely luminous and long-lived outburst from the nucleus of an otherwise quiescent, low luminosity (LMC-like) galaxy. Named Swift J1644+57, its combination of… Expand
Discovery of a New Kind of Explosive X-Ray Transient near M86
We present the discovery of a new type of explosive X-ray flash in Chandra images of the old elliptical galaxy M86. This unique event is characterized by the peak luminosity of 6 × 10{sup 42} erg… Expand
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We present optical, X-ray and gamma-ray observations of GRB 111209A, at a redshift of z = 0.677. We show that this event was active in its prompt phase for about 25000 seconds, making it the longest… Expand
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The tidal disruption of stars by supermassive black holes produces luminous soft X-ray accretion flares in otherwise inactive galaxies. First events have been discovered in X-rays with the ROSAT… Expand
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On March 28, 2011, the Swift Burst Alert Telescope triggered on an object that had no analog in over six years of Swift operations. Follow-up observations by the Swift X-ray Telescope (XRT) found a… Expand
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