The Brightest Gamma Ray Burst Ever Recorded
The Gamma Ray Burst (GRB) 22 1009a is officially the most powerful GRB ever recorded. GRBs are some of the most energetic phenomena in the universe since the Big Bang itself, emitting enough energy to sterilize entire regions of their home galaxies. While such events might occur in a galaxy once every few million years or so, GRB 22 1009a was so powerful that it temporarily blinded the Fermi Gamma Ray Telescope when it was detected by the Geral Swift Observatory and XMM Newton Telescopes.
Unprecedented Findings
The initial outburst was followed up by a number of observations at all wavelengths to figure out what caused it. These findings have turned up a number of surprising results that call into question our understanding of GRBs. For example, GRBs are thought to mark the beginning of a supernova, but neither Hubble nor the James Webb Space Telescopes found any evidence of one. Additionally, GRB 22 1009a was surprisingly faint in the radio spectrum, despite the fact that GRBs should emit very strongly at all wavelengths.
A Special Issue of the Astrophysical Journal
The unexpected findings of GRB 22 1009a were so weird and amazing that a series of papers about it were published in a special issue of the Astrophysical Journal. It is estimated that a burst this powerful might occur only once every 10,000 years, making it the most energetic GRB to reach Earth since the dawn of human civilization. That is why astronomers dubbed GRB 22 1009a the Brightest of All Time or the BOAT.
The brightest grb ever seen.
Introduction
Gamma ray bursts (GRBs) are some of the most energetic events in the universe. They are generally classified by their duration, with short GRBs lasting under two seconds and long GRBs lasting anywhere from two seconds to several hours. Both scenarios produce an initial burst of gamma ray emission, followed by a longer lasting afterglow. In this article, we will explore the properties of GRBs, the physics behind them, and the puzzle of what causes them.
Short GRBs
Short GRBs are thought to be caused when a pair of neutron stars collide. This collision sets off what is called a kilonova. The kilonova produces an initial burst of gamma ray emission, followed by a longer lasting afterglow. By studying the afterglow, we can learn about the properties of the surrounding medium, the physics of the GRB itself, and piece together the puzzle of what caused the burst in the first place.
Long GRBs
Long GRBs are thought to occur when the core of a very massive star collapses to form a black hole. After the initial burst of gamma ray emission, the leading edge of the jet collides with the surrounding interstellar medium. This shock front produces emission at longer wavelengths, starting from X-rays and going all the way to radio.
If the GRB came from a black hole inside of a collapsing star, there is a third act to follow. The black hole’s jet ignites runaway fusion inside the star’s interior, which explodes the star from the inside out. The result is an extremely energetic supernova, sometimes called a hypernova. These long duration bursts are so energetic that they can easily outshine their host galaxies.
The brightest GRB ever seen was GRB 22 1009a, which was detected when it first occurred.
The Brightest Gamma Ray Burst in Human History
The new record holder, the boat, was so bright it actually blinded the instruments on the Fermi gamma ray telescope when its actual bright business was later reconstructed. It blew all of the other bursts out of the water and was so bright it was detected by instruments that weren’t even designed for this purpose.
The First Detection
The very first detection was picked up a day earlier by Voyager 1, which is now an Interstellar space. A day later, the bursts reached the inner solar system and was detected by issas, Gaia, satellite at L2 and then the integral satellite in CIS lunar space about one second later it was detected by Fermi and grb Alpha in low earth orbit. The burst even irradiated Earth’s ionosphere and continued to L1, where it was detected by the ace and wind spacecraft studying the Sun and then a few minutes later it was detected at Mars by Maven and Mars Odyssey.
A Rare Event
Something this bright doesn’t happen very often. In fact, the boat was calculated as being a nearly once in ten thousand year event. Human civilization is only about six thousand years old, so it’s quite possible the boat is literally the brightest gamma ray burst in human history. Lucky for us, we just happen to have telescopes in space that could study it.
Unusual Behaviour
However, the boat is behaving in ways that really don’t make sense. Bursts like these are understood to be associated with dying, massive stars, but so far the boat hasnt shown any evidence of a supernova.
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Investigating the Brightest Afterglow
Despite the fact that the brightest ever seen afterglow at X-ray wavelengths was surprisingly quiet in radio, we are going to investigate why it wasn’t brighter at radio wavelengths and why it was so extraordinarily bright to begin with.
The Brightest Gamma Ray Burst Ever Detected
The boat was the brightest gamma ray burst ever detected, but strangely, its radio and Afterglow were not unusually bright at all. It gets even more interesting when you look at how the radio, visible, and x-ray emission faded out over time. Each color corresponds to some time after the burst.
Standard Models of Gamma Ray Bursts
Over the last 50 years of studying GRBs, a number of standard models have been developed that describe how the Afterglow fades across different wavelengths. When the models were run against the boat, they matched up with the visible and x-ray emission quite well, but largely came up short on the radio. The modeling also indicated that, although the boat was the brightest ever seen, it may not have actually been all that powerful in terms of the total energy released.
The Boat’s Origin
Rather, it may have appeared so bright because all of its energy was concentrated into a very tight beam and that beam happened to be aimed directly at Earth. It turns out that the boat originated at a redshift of 0.15, which works out to about 1.9 billion light years away. Surprisingly, that’s not particularly far for a gamma ray burst.
The Strange Case of the Boat
Long bursts are thought to come from dying, massive stars. As the Afterglow of the burst Fades out, the underlying light from the Supernova Starts to become visible, so the light curve of the burst tends to stabilize and stay bright as the Supernova takes over. However, something strange happened when the boat appeared. No Supernova was detected, even though the conditions were right for one to occur.
The Milky Way’s Dusty Veil
The boat came from a direction that was almost directly in line with the plane of the Milky Way galaxy. This meant its light had to pass through some 60 thousand light years of our galaxy, which is Laden with dust. Dust in our galaxy could have blocked up to 99 of its visible light.
The James Webb Space Telescope
Fortunately, longer wavelengths, like near infrared, can sidestep much of this dust. To that end, the James Webb Space Telescope captured Spectra of the boat at both near and mid infrared wavelengths. This was the first time the mid infrared spectrum of a grb had ever been obtained.
No Evidence of a Supernova
But if a supernova were taking place, there should have been some excess submission or changes in web Spectrum over time, but neither of those effects were detected. This might be because there was more dust at work here than just that from our galaxy alone.
The Mystery of N6946bh1
A near infrared image made with the Hubble Space Telescope has revealed an extended feature emerging from a burst. This feature is actually the burst’s home Galaxy, and appears to be a spiral seen Edge on. This means that the Supernova would have had to have penetrated through its home Galaxy’s disk and then through the disk of the Milky Way before arriving at Earth.
The Possibility of a Direct Collapse Black Hole
In 2015, the mass of star N6946bh1 disappeared without a trace. This has led to speculation that this particular star was a direct collapse black hole. This could present us with a new kind of intermediate case, where a massive star’s core collapses to create a black hole which in turn kicks off a gamma ray burst. The black hole then gets so massive, so quickly, that it reverses and consumes the subsequent Supernova.
The Possibility of Colliding Neutron Stars
Alternatively, it is possible that the burst was not triggered from a collapsing massive star at all, but rather by a pair of colliding neutron stars. Such events trigger a shorter and less energetic gamma ray burst. If the burst was confined to an extremely narrow Jet and aimed directly toward Earth, it would then make the burst appear bright enough to become the boat. However, colliding neutron stars are thought to produce GRBs that are only between a few milliseconds to no more than a couple of seconds long.
The Outburst of Boats
In 2022, rust in the jod and collaborators reported the discovery of a kill Anova associated with a GRB that lasted nearly a minute. This was a surprise, as the initial assumption was that the Outburst of Boats had lasted 600 seconds due to it being a collapsing massive star. To explain the discrepancy, it was proposed that the Outburst of Boats was actually a pair of colliding neutron stars that managed to create a GRB that lasted up to 10 minutes longer. This would require an ultra collimated jet aimed directly at Earth, which seemed unlikely.
Strong Magnetic Fields
In order to collimate the jet so tightly, extremely strong magnetic fields would be required. The stronger the magnetic fields, the more polarized the light emitted by the initial burst. To measure this, the Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) was used. The polarization of the Afterglow was found to be high, but not the highest recorded for a burst.
Galactic Clouds
The Outburst of Boats was glimpsed through the plane of the Galaxy, with light passing through Galactic clouds and scattering to form the Rings surrounding the burst. It is possible that these dust clouds reduced the polarization of the light in some way. To confirm this, more observations as the Afterglow Fades are needed. In total, 21 Rings were counted, indicating that the burst had to pass through no fewer than 21 clouds, ranging from as close as 700 light years from Earth to as many as 61 000 light years.
The Boat GRB and the Structure of our Galaxy
The Boat GRB, or Gamma Ray Burst, is a powerful explosion of energy that was detected on the other side of the Galaxy. This burst of light has allowed astronomers to probe the structure of our galaxy, as the angle of incidence of the light is about 4 degrees, meaning that the most distant Rings were formed above the plane of our galaxy.
Why is There Dust Above the Galactic Plane?
It turns out that our galaxy is not perfectly flat, but rather has a warp on either end. On the far side, the warp is lifted upward, and this allowed just enough dust present for the boat GRB to pass through. This has allowed astronomers to gain insight into the history of our galaxy’s formation, which includes mergers and collisions with smaller galaxies.
Continued Observations
The boat GRB disappeared behind the Sun for a couple of months, but it has since reappeared, and more observations are being conducted. There are still many questions left to be addressed and much more to be learned.
The boat GRB has allowed astronomers to gain insight into the structure and history of our galaxy. Continued observations are being conducted, and there are still many questions left to be addressed and much more to be learned.
