We discuss the importance and potential contribution of Athena+ to the science questions related to gamma-ray bursts, tidal disruption events and supernova shock break-out. Athena+ will allow breakthrough observations involving high-resolution X-ray spectroscopic observations of high-z gamma-ray bursts, observations of tidal disruption events tailored to determine the mass and potentially the spin of the black hole responsible for the tidal disruption and observations of X-rays from the supernova shock breakout providing a measure of the radius of the exploding star or of the companion in the case of type Ia supernovae. We briefly discuss survey facilities that will provide triggers to these events envisaged to be operational around 2028.
@article{arxiv.1306.2336,
title = {The Hot and Energetic Universe: Luminous extragalactic transients},
author = {Peter Jonker and Paul O'Brien and Lorenzo Amati and Jean-Luc Atteia and Sergio Campana and Phil Evans and Rob Fender and Chryssa Kouveliotou and Giuseppe Lodato and Julian Osborne and Luigi Piro and Arne Rau and Nial Tanvir and Richard Willingale},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1306.2336},
year = {2013}
}
Comments
Supporting paper for the science theme "The Hot and Energetic Universe" to be implemented by the Athena+ X-ray observatory (http://www.the-athena-x-ray-observatory.eu). 8 pages, 3 figures