Related papers: Asymmetric Wolf-Rayet winds: implications for GRB …
The association of long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with Type Ib/c supernovae implies that they explode into the winds of their Wolf-Rayet progenitor stars. Although the evolution of some GRB afterglows is consistent with expansion into a free…
Although observations of circumstellar shock interactions around supernovae are generally consistent with a 1/r**2 density profile wind surrounding the progenitor star, this is not true for GRB (gamma-ray burst) afterglows. However, GRB…
A very small fraction of (runaway) massive stars have masses exceeding $60$-$70\, \rm M_{\odot}$ and are predicted to evolve as Luminous-Blue-Variable and Wolf-Rayet stars before ending their lives as core-collapse supernovae. Our 2D…
The favoured progenitors of long-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are rapidly rotating Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars. However, most Galactic WR stars are slow rotators, as stellar winds are thought to remove angular momentum. This poses a challenge…
(abridged) The strong winds of Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are important for the mechanical and chemical feedback of the most massive stars and determine whether they end their lives as neutron stars or black holes. In this work we investigate…
(Abridged) Mass-loss from massive stars leads to the formation of circumstellar wind-blown bubbles surrounding the star, bordered by a dense shell. When the star ends its life in a supernova (SN) explosion, the resulting shock wave will…
When two massive stars orbit each other, their winds create a shock cone. In some cases, an evolved, carbon-rich Wolf-Rayet (WR) star's wind collides with that of an orbiting OB star, condensing into dust downstream. This dust is then seen…
We model the interaction between the wind from a newly formed rapidly rotating magnetar and the surrounding progenitor. In the first few seconds after core collapse the magnetar inflates a bubble of plasma and magnetic fields behind the…
An X-ray study of a deeply embedded Wolf-Rayet star WR 121a has been carried out using long-term (spanning over ~12 years) archival observations from Chandra and XMM-Newton. For the first time, a periodic variation with a period of 4.1 days…
Fast rotating Wolf-Rayet stars are expected to be progenitors of long duration gamma-ray bursts. However, the observational test of this model is problematic. Spectral lines of Wolf-Rayet stars originate in expanding stellar wind, therefore…
Optical and radio afterglows arising from the shocks by relativistic conical ejecta running into pre-burst massive stellar winds are revisited. Under the homogeneous thin-shell approximation and a realistic treatment for the lateral…
We propose to identify pulsar-wind bubbles (PWBs) as the environment in which the afterglow emission in at least some gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) originates. Such bubbles could naturally account for the high fraction of the internal energy…
We study the effect of wind anisotropies on the stellar evolution leading to collapsars. Rotating models of a 60 M$_\odot$ star with $\Omega/\Omega_{\rm crit}=0.75$ on the ZAMS, accounting for shellular rotation and a magnetic field, with…
The spin of Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars at low metallicity (Z) is most relevant for our understanding of gravitational wave sources such as GW 150914, as well as the incidence of long-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Two scenarios have been…
We seek to understand the evolution of Wolf-Rayet central stars by comparing the diffuse X-ray emission from their wind-blown bubbles with that from their hydrogen-rich counterparts with predictions from hydrodynamical models. We simulate…
Several gamma-ray binaries show extended X-ray emission that may be associated to interactions of an outflow with the medium. Some of these systems are, or may be, high-mass binaries harboring young nonaccreting pulsars, in which the…
Because most massive stars have been or will be affected by a companion during the course of their evolution, we cannot afford to neglect binaries when discussing the progenitors of supernovae and GRBs. Analyzing linear polarization in the…
Gamma-ray binaries are colliding wind binaries (CWB) composed of a massive star a non-accreting pulsar with a highly relativistic wind. Particle acceleration at the shocks results in emission going from extended radio emission to the…
WR 140 is a long-period, highly eccentric Wolf-Rayet star binary system with exceptionally well-determined orbital and stellar parameters. Bright, variable X-ray emission is generated in shocks produced by the collision of the winds of the…
We study the evolution of the interstellar and circumstellar media around massive stars (M > 40M_{\odot}) from the main sequence through to the Wolf-Rayet stage by means of radiationhydrodynamic simulations. We use publicly available…