Thermal Electrons in Gamma-Ray Burst Afterglows

Sean M. Ressler, Tanmoy Laskar

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40 Citations (SciVal)

Abstract

To date, nearly all multi-wavelength modeling of long-duration γ-ray bursts has ignored synchrotron radiation from the significant population of electrons expected to pass the shock without acceleration into a power-law distribution. We investigate the effect of including the contribution of thermal, non-accelerated electrons to synchrotron absorption and emission in the standard afterglow model, and show that these thermal electrons provide an additional source of opacity to synchrotron self-absorption, and yield an additional emission component at higher energies. The extra opacity results in an increase in the synchrotron self-absorption frequency by factors of 10–100 for fiducial parameters. The nature of the additional emission depends on the details of the thermal population, but is generally observed to yield a spectral peak in the optical brighter than radiation from the nonthermal population by similar factors a few seconds after the burst, remaining detectable at millimeter and radio frequencies several days later.
Original languageEnglish
Article number150
Number of pages7
JournalThe Astrophysical Journal
Volume845
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 22 Aug 2017

Keywords

  • astro-ph.HE

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