IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v9y2018i1d10.1038_s41467-018-06558-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A luminous blue kilonova and an off-axis jet from a compact binary merger at z = 0.1341

Author

Listed:
  • E. Troja

    (University of Maryland
    NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)

  • G. Ryan

    (University of Maryland)

  • L. Piro

    (INAF, Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziali)

  • H. Eerten

    (University of Bath, Claverton Down)

  • S. B. Cenko

    (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
    University of Maryland)

  • Y. Yoon

    (Seoul National University)

  • S.-K. Lee

    (Seoul National University)

  • M. Im

    (Seoul National University)

  • T. Sakamoto

    (Aoyama Gakuin University)

  • P. Gatkine

    (University of Maryland)

  • A. Kutyrev

    (University of Maryland
    NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)

  • S. Veilleux

    (University of Maryland
    University of Maryland)

Abstract

The recent discovery of a gamma-ray burst (GRB) coincident with the gravitational-wave (GW) event GW170817 revealed the existence of a population of low-luminosity short duration gamma-ray transients produced by neutron star mergers in the nearby Universe. These events could be routinely detected by existing gamma-ray monitors, yet previous observations failed to identify them without the aid of GW triggers. Here we show that GRB150101B is an analogue of GRB170817A located at a cosmological distance. GRB150101B is a faint short burst characterized by a bright optical counterpart and a long-lived X-ray afterglow. These properties are unusual for standard short GRBs and are instead consistent with an explosion viewed off-axis: the optical light is produced by a luminous kilonova, while the observed X-rays trace the GRB afterglow viewed at an angle of ~13°. Our findings suggest that these properties could be common among future electromagnetic counterparts of GW sources.

Suggested Citation

  • E. Troja & G. Ryan & L. Piro & H. Eerten & S. B. Cenko & Y. Yoon & S.-K. Lee & M. Im & T. Sakamoto & P. Gatkine & A. Kutyrev & S. Veilleux, 2018. "A luminous blue kilonova and an off-axis jet from a compact binary merger at z = 0.1341," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 9(1), pages 1-10, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-06558-7
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-06558-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-06558-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-018-06558-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-06558-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.