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Register a new userA Comprehensive Study of Gamma-Ray Burst Optical Emission: II. Afterglow Onset and Late Re-Brightening Components
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En-Wei Liang
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We continue our systematic statistical study of various components in gamma-ray burst (GRB) optical lightcurves. We decompose the early onset bump and the late re-brightening bump with empirical fits and analyze their statistical properties. Among the 146 GRBs that have well-sampled optical lightcurves, the onset and re-brightening bumps are observed in 38 and 26 GRBs, respectively. It is found that the typical rising and decaying slopes for both the onset and re-brightening bumps are ~1.5 and -1.15, respectively. No early onset bumps in the X-ray band are detected to be associated with the optical onset bumps, while an X-ray re-brightening bump is detected for half of the re-brightening optical bumps. The peak luminosity is anti-correlated with the peak time, L_ppropto t_{p}^{-1.81+/-0.32} and L_ppropto t_{p}^{-0.83+/-0.17} for the onset and re-brightening bumps, respectively. Both L_p and the isotropic energy release of the onset bumps are correlated with E_{gamma, iso}, whereas no similar correlation is found for the re-brightening bumps. Taking the onset bumps as probes for the properties of the fireballs and their ambient medium, we find that the typical power-law index of the relativistic electrons is 2.5 and the medium density profile behaves as npropto r^{-1} within the framework of the synchrotron external shock models. With the medium density profile obtained from our analysis, we also confirm the correlation between initial Lorentz factor (Gamma_0) and E_{gamma, iso} in our previous work. The jet component that produces the re-brightening bump seems to be on-axis and independent of the prompt emission jet component. Its typical kinetic energy budget would be about one order of magnitude larger than the prompt emission component, but with a lower Gamma_0, typically several tens.
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Well-sampled optical lightcurves of 146 gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are compiled from the literature. By empirical fitting we identify eight possible emission components and summarize the results in a synthetic lightcurve. Both optical flare and early shallow-decay components are likely related to long-term central engine activities. We focus on their statistical properties in this paper. Twenty-four optical flares are obtained from 19 GRBs. The isotropic R-band energy is smaller than 1% of $E_{gamma, rm iso}$. The relation between isotropic luminosities of the flares and gamma-rays follows $L^{rm F}_{rm R, iso}propto L_{{gamma}, rm iso}^{1.11pm 0.27}$. Later flares tend to be wider and dimmer, i.e., $w^{rm F}sim t^{rm F}_{rm p}/2$ and $L^{rm F}_{rm R, iso}propto [t^{rm F}_{rm p}/(1+z)]^{-1.15pm0.15}$. The detection probability of the optical flares is much smaller than that of X-ray flares. An optical shallow decay segment is observed in 39 GRBs. The relation between the break time and break luminosity is a power-law, with an index of $-0.78pm 0.08$, similar to that derived from X-ray flares. The X-ray and optical breaks are usually chromatic, but a tentative correlation is found. We suggest that similar to the prompt optical emission that tracks $gamma$-rays, the optical flares are also related to the erratic behavior of the central engine. The shallow decay component is likely related to a long-lasting spinning-down central engine or piling up of flare materials onto the blastwave. Mixing of different emission components may be the reason of the diverse chromatic afterglow behaviors.
We continue our systematic statistical study on optical afterglow data of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). We present the apparent magnitude distributions of early optical afterglows at different epochs (t= 10^2 s, t = 10^3 s, and 1 hour) for the optical lightcurves of a sample of 93 GRBs (the global sample), and for sub-samples with an afterglow onset bump or a shallow decay segment. For the onset sample and shallow decay sample we also present the brightness distribution at the peak time t_{p} and break time t_{b}, respectively. All the distributions can be fit with Gaussian functions. We further perform Monte Carlo simulations to infer the luminosity function of GRB optical emission at the rest-frame time 10^3 seconds, t_{p}, and t_{b}, respectively. Our results show that a single power-law luminosity function is adequate to model the data, with indices -1.40+/-0.10, -1.06+/- 0.16, and -1.54+/- 0.22, respectively. Based on the derived rest-frame 10^3 s luminosity function, we generate the intrinsic distribution of the R-band apparent magnitude M_{R} at the observed time 10^{3} seconds post trigger, which peaks at M_{R}=22.5 mag. The fraction of GRBs whose R-band magnitude is fainter than 22 mag, and 25 mag and at the observer time 10^3 seconds are ~63% and ~25%, respectively. The detection probabilities of the optical afterglows with ground-based robotic telescopes and UVOT onboard {Swift} are roughly consistent with that inferred from this intrinsic M_{R} distribution, indicating that the variations of the dark GRB fraction among the samples with different telescopes may be due to the observational selection effect, although the existence of an intrinsically dark GRB population cannot be ruled out.
We compared the time (or time limit) of onset for optical afterglow emission to the gamma-ray variability V in 76 GRBs with redshifts. In the subset (25 cases) with the rise evident in the data, we fit the shape of the onset peak as well and compared the rising and decaying indices to V. We did not find any evidence for any patterns between these properties and there is no statistical support for any correlations. This indicates a lack of connection between irregularities of the prompt gamma-ray emission and the establishment of the afterglow phase. In the ordinary prompt internal shocks interpretation, this would indicate a lack of relationship between V and the bulk Lorentz factor of the event.
We report the optical polarization of a gamma ray burst (GRB) afterglow, obtained 203 seconds after the initial burst of gamma rays from GRB 060418, using a ring polarimeter on the robotic Liverpool Telescope. Our robust (2-sigma) upper limit on the percentage of polarization, less than 8%, coincides with the fireball deceleration time at the onset of the afterglow. The combination of the rate of decay of the optical brightness and the low polarization at this critical time constrains standard models of GRB ejecta, ruling out the presence of a large-scale ordered magnetic field in the emitting region.
The optical light that is generated simultaneously with the x-rays and gamma-rays during a gamma-ray burst (GRB) provides clues about the nature of the explosions that occur as massive stars collapse to form black holes. We report on the bright optical flash and fading afterglow from the powerful burst GRB 130427A and present a comparison with the properties of the gamma-ray emission that show correlation of the optical and >100 MeV photon flux light curves during the first 7,000 seconds. We attribute this correlation to co-generation in an external shock. The simultaneous, multi-color, optical observations are best explained at early times by reverse shock emission generated in the relativistic burst ejecta as it collides with surrounding material and at late times by a forward shock traversing the circumburst environment. The link between optical afterglow and >100 MeV emission suggests that nearby early peaked afterglows will be the best candidates for studying GRB emission at GeV/TeV energies.
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