Related papers: Heating and deceleration of GRB fireballs by neutr…
Standard GRB fireballs must carry free neutrons. This crucially changes the mechanism of fireball deceleration by an external medium. As the ion fireball decelerates, the coasting neutrons form a leading front. They gradually decay, leaving…
We consider the physics of neutrinos in a fireball, i.e. a tightly coupled plasma of photons, positrons and electrons. Such a fireball is believed to form in the first stages of a gamma-ray burst. We assume the fireball is…
The fireball, the promising model of the gamma-ray burst (GRB), is an opaque radiation plasma, whose energy is significantly greater than its rest mass. We numerically simulate the evolution of the fireball heated by the…
We point out that the baryon-loading problem in Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB) models can be amelioriated if a significant fraction of the baryons which inertially confine the fireball are converted to neutrons. A high neutron fraction in some…
We study three processes that shape the nuclear composition of GRB fireballs: (1) neutronization in the central engine, (2) nucleosynthesis in the fireball as it expands and cools, and (3) spallation of nuclei in subsequent internal shocks.…
The customary picture of the fireball deceleration by an external medium neglects two physical agents in the problem that are important at radii R<10^{17} cm: a radiative precursor (the prompt GRB) and a relativistic front of free neutrons.…
The evolution of a dilute electron-positron fireball is calculated in the regime of strong magnetization and very high compactness (l ~10^3-10^8). Heating is applied at a low effective temperature (< 25 keV), and the fireball is allowed to…
We investigate the fate of very compact, sudden energy depositions that may lie at the origin of gamma-ray bursts. Following on from the work of Cavallo and Rees (1978), we take account of the much higher energies now believed to be…
The central engine which powers the Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB) fireball, produces neutrinos in the energy range of about 5-20 MeV. Fractions of these neutrinos may propagate through the fireball which is far away from the central engine. We have…
A constraint between thermal fireball parameters arises from the requirement that the balance of strangeness in a fireball is (nearly) zero. We study the impact of this constraint on (multi-)strange (anti-)baryon multiplicities and compare…
We calculate and discuss the light element freeze-out nucleosynthesis in high entropy winds and fireballs for broad ranges of entropy-per-baryon, dynamic timescales characterizing relativistic expansion, and neutron-to-proton ratios. With…
Observations suggest that $\gamma$-ray bursts (GRBs) are produced by the dissipation of the kinetic energy of a relativistic fireball. We show that a large fraction, $\ge 10%$, of the fireball energy is expected to be converted by…
It is proposed that the baryons in gamma ray burst (GRB) fireballs originate as "pick-up" neutrons that leak in sideways from surrounding baryonic matter and convert to protons in a collision avalanche. The asymptotic Lorentz factor is…
Robust generation of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) implies the formation of outflows with very low baryon loads and highly relativistic velocities, but more baryon-rich, slower outflows are also likely to occur in most GRB central engine…
A GRB afterglow has been commonly thought to be due to continuous deceleration of a postburst fireball. Many analytical models have made simplifications for deceleration dynamics of the fireball and its radiation property, although they are…
Fireballs of gamma-ray bursts are partially made of free neutrons. Their presence crucially changes the mechanism of the fireball deceleration by an external medium. At late stages of the explosion, neutrons fully decouple from ions and…
Neutrons play an important role in the dynamics of gamma-ray bursts. The presence of neutrons in the baryon-loaded fireball is expected. If the neutrons abundance is comparable to that of protons, important features may be observed such as…
We argue that ultrahigh energy cosmic ray collisions in the Earth atmosphere can probe the strange quark density of the nucleon. These collisions have center-of-mass energies \agt 10^{4.6} A GeV, where A \geq 14 is the nuclear baryon…
The study of neutron stars is a topic of central interest in the investigation of the properties of strongly compressed hadronic matter. Whereas in heavy-ion collisions the fireball, created in the collision zone, contains very hot matter,…
We consider fireball models where the ejecta have a range of bulk Lorentz factors, so that the inner (lower $\Gamma$) parts may carry most of the mass, or even most of the energy. The outer shock and contact discontinuity decelerate as the…