1998/07/30 by J. P. Norris, J. T. Bonnell, K. Watanabe · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/307299
25 pages, 5 figures
arxiv created 1998/07/30 · openalex publication_date 1999/06/20 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
We explore the hypothesis, similar to one recently suggested by Bloom and colleagues, that some nearby supernovae are associated with smooth, single-pulse gamma-ray bursts, possibly having no emission above ~300 keV. We examine BATSE bursts with durations longer than 2 s, fitting those which can be visually characterized as single-pulse events with a lognormal pulse model. The fraction of events that can be reliably ascertained to be temporally and spectrally similar to the exemplar, GRB 980425—possibly associated with SN 1998bw—is 4/1573 or 0.25%. This fraction could be as high as 8/1573 (0.5%) if the dimmest bursts are included. Approximately 1.5% of bursts are morphologically similar to GRB 980425 but have emission above ~300 keV. A search of supernova catalogs containing 630 detections during BATSE's lifetime reveals only one burst (GRB 980425) within a 3 month time window and within the total 3 σ BATSE error radius that could be associated with a Type Ib/c supernova. Thus, we find no further evidence to support a single-pulse GRB and SN Ib/c connection. We also find no tendency for any set of single-pulse GRBs to fall near the supergalactic plane, whereas SNe of Type Ib/c do show this tendency—evidence that the two phenomena are not related.