The bright optical afterglow of the nearby γ-ray burst of 29 March 2003
Abstract
Past studies of cosmological y-ray bursts (GRBs) have been hampered by their extreme distances, resulting in faint afterglows. A nearby GRB could potentially shed much light on the origin of these events, but GRBs with a redshift z ≤ 0.2 have been estimated to occur only rarely, about once per decade. Here we report the discovery of the bright optical afterglow emission from the burst of 29 March 2003 (GRB030329; ref. 2). The brightness of the afterglow and the prompt report of its position resulted in extensive follow-up observations at many wavelengths, along with the measurement of the redshift, z = 0.169 (ref. 4). The y-ray and afterglow properties of GRB030329 are similar to those of GRBs at cosmological redshifts. Observations have already identified the progenitor as a massive star that exploded as a supernova.
Additional Information
© 2003 Nature Publishing Group. Received 15 April; accepted 21 May 2003. P.A.P. and B.P.S. thank the ARC for supporting Australian GRB research. GRB research at Caltech is supported in part by funds from NSF and NASA. We are indebted to S. Barthelmy and the GCN, as well as the HETE-II team for prompt alerts of GRB localizations.Attached Files
Submitted - 0309419.pdf
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Additional details
- Alternative title
- The bright optical afterglow of the nearby gamma-ray burst of 29 March 2003
- Eprint ID
- 56296
- DOI
- 10.1038/nature01734
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20150401-140640866
- Australian Research Council
- NSF
- NASA
- Created
-
2015-04-01Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-10Created from EPrint's last_modified field
- Caltech groups
- Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences