2000/02/22 by Benedetta Ciardi, Abraham Loeb · 8 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Afterglow #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics and Cosmic Phenomena #Flux (metallurgy) #Galaxy #Gamma-ray burst #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Infrared #Intergalactic travel #Redshift #Star formation #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/309384
29 pages, 14 figures; submitted to ApJ
arxiv created 2000/02/22 · openalex publication_date 2000/09/10 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
If gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) occur at high redshifts, then their bright afterglow emission can be used to probe the ionization and metal enrichment histories of the intervening intergalactic medium during the epoch of reionization. In contrast to other sources, such as galaxies or quasars, which fade rapidly with increasing redshift, the observed infrared flux from a GRB afterglow at a fixed observed age is only a weak function of its redshift. This results from a combination of the spectral slope of GRB afterglows and the time stretching of their evolution in the observer's frame. Assuming that the GRB rate is proportional to the star formation rate and that the characteristic energy output of GRBs is ~10 52 ergs, we predict that there are always ~15 GRBs from redshifts z ≳ 5 across the sky that are brighter than ~100 nJy at an observed wavelength of ~2 μm. The infrared spectrum of these sources could be taken with the future Next Generation Space Telescope as a follow-up to early X-ray localization with the Swift satellite.