GRB 081029: Understanding Multiple Afterglow Components
Abstract
We present an analysis of the unusual optical light curve of the gamma-ray burst GRB~081029, which occurred at a redshift of z = 3.8479$. We combine X-ray and optical observations from the Swift X-Ray Telescope and the Swift UltraViolet/Optical Telescope with optical and infrared data obtained using the REM and ROTSE telescopes to construct a detailed data set extending from 86 s to approximately 100,000 s after the BAT trigger. Our data also cover a wide energy range, from 10 keV to 0.77 eV (1.24 Angstrom to 16,000 Angstrom). The X-ray afterglow shows a shallow initial decay followed by a rapid decay starting at about 18,000s. The optical and infrared afterglow, however, shows an uncharacteristic rise at about 5000 s that does not correspond to any feature in the X-ray light curve. Our data are not consistent with synchrotron radiation from a single-component jet interacting with an external medium. We do, however, find that the observed light curve can be explained using multi-component model for the jet.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1101.5952,
title = {GRB 081029: Understanding Multiple Afterglow Components},
author = {S. T. Holland and M. De Pasquale and J. Mao and T. Sakamoto and P. Schady and S. Covino and P. D'Avanzo and A. Antonelli and V. D'Elia and G. Chincarini and F. Fiore and S. B. Pandey},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1101.5952},
year = {2015}
}
Comments
4 pages, 3 figures, to appear in the AIP Conference Proceedings for the Gamma-Ray Burst 2010 Conference, Annapolis, MD, USA, November 2010