Related papers: Optical afterglows of short Gamma-ray Bursts and G…

Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) fall into two classes: short-hard and long-soft bursts. The latter are now known to have X-ray and optical afterglows, to occur at cosmological distances in star-forming galaxies, and to be associated with the…

[Abridged] The study of short-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) experienced a complete revolution in recent years thanks to the discovery of the first afterglows and host galaxies in May 2005. These observations demonstrated that short GRBs…

Short GRBs are commonly thought to originate from the merging of double compact object binaries but direct evidence for this scenario is still missing. Optical observations of short GRBs allow us to measure redshifts, firmly identify host…

[abridged] We investigate the afterglow properties and large-scale environments of several short-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with sub-arcsecond optical afterglow positions but no bright coincident host galaxies. The purpose of this…

It has long been known that there are two classes of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), mainly distinguished by their durations. The breakthrough in our understanding of long-duration GRBs (those lasting more than ~2 s), which ultimately linked them…

The number of detections as well as significantly deep non-detections of optical/NIR afterglows of Type I (short-duration population) Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) has become large enough that statistically meaningful samples can now be…

The final chapter in the long-standing mystery of the gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) centres on the origin of the short-hard class, suspected on theoretical grounds to result from the coalescence of neutron star or black hole binary systems.…

We use a large sample of GRB afterglow and prompt-emission data (adding further GRB afterglow observations in this work) to compare the optical afterglows (or the lack thereof) of Type I GRBs with those of Type II GRBs. In comparison to the…

The study of short-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) has undergone a revolution in recent years thanks to the discovery of the first afterglows and host galaxies in May 2005. In this review we summarize our current knowledge of the galactic…

Afterglows of Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) are simple in the most basic model, but can show many complex features. The ultra-long duration GRB 111209A, one of the longest GRBs ever detected, also has the best-monitored afterglow in this rare…

We have gathered optical photometry data from the literature on a large sample of Swift-era gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglows including GRBs up to September 2009, for a total of 76 GRBs, and present an additional three pre-Swift GRBs not…

In this paper we present a sample of 10 short gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with a robust redshift determination, discovered by the Swift satellite up to January 2011. We measure their X-ray absorbing column densities and collect data on the host…

Very early observations with the Swift satellite of gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglows reveal that the optical component is not detected in a large number of cases. This is in contrast to the bright optical flashes previously discovered in…

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) display a bimodal duration distribution, with a separation between the short- and long-duration bursts at about 2 sec. The progenitors of long GRBs have been identified as massive stars based on their association…

Gamma-ray bursts categorically produce broadband afterglow emission, but in some cases, emission in the optical band is dimmer than expected based on the contemporaneously observed X-ray flux. This phenomenon, aptly dubbed "optical…

Gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglow observations have allowed us to significantly constrain the engines producing these energetic explosions. Te redshift and position information provided by these afterglows have already allowed us to limit the…

The 1-m telescope at Lulin Observatory and the 0.76-m Katzman Automatic Imaging Telescope at Lick Observatory were used to observe the optical afterglow of the short-duration (1.2--1.5 s) gamma-ray burst (GRB) 040924. This object has a soft…

We systematically reanalyzed all Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB) afterglow data published through the end of 2002, in an attempt to detect the predicted supernova light component and to gain statistical insight on its phenomenological properties. We…

New information on short/hard gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) is being gathered thanks to the discovery of their optical and X-ray afterglows. However, some key aspects are still poorly understood, including the collimation level of the outflow,…

Short gamma-ray bursts (sGRBs) are widely believed to result from the mergers of compact binaries. This model predicts an afterglow that bears the characteristic signatures of a constant, low density medium, including a smooth…