The association of GRB 060218 with a supernova and the evolution of the shock wave. Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • Although the link between long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and supernovae has been established, hitherto there have been no observations of the beginning of a supernova explosion and its intimate link to a GRB. In particular, we do not know how the jet that defines a gamma-ray burst emerges from the star's surface, nor how a GRB progenitor explodes. Here we report observations of the relatively nearby GRB 060218 (ref. 5) and its connection to supernova SN 2006aj (ref. 6). In addition to the classical non-thermal emission, GRB 060218 shows a thermal component in its X-ray spectrum, which cools and shifts into the optical/ultraviolet band as time passes. We interpret these features as arising from the break-out of a shock wave driven by a mildly relativistic shell into the dense wind surrounding the progenitor. We have caught a supernova in the act of exploding, directly observing the shock break-out, which indicates that the GRB progenitor was a Wolf-Rayet star.

published proceedings

  • Nature

altmetric score

  • 3.5

author list (cited authors)

  • Campana, S., Mangano, V., Blustin, A. J., Brown, P., Burrows, D. N., Chincarini, G., ... White, N. E.

citation count

  • 618

complete list of authors

  • Campana, S||Mangano, V||Blustin, AJ||Brown, P||Burrows, DN||Chincarini, G||Cummings, JR||Cusumano, G||Della Valle, M||Malesani, D||Mészáros, P||Nousek, JA||Page, M||Sakamoto, T||Waxman, E||Zhang, B||Dai, ZG||Gehrels, N||Immler, S||Marshall, FE||Mason, KO||Moretti, A||O'Brien, PT||Osborne, JP||Page, KL||Romano, P||Roming, PWA||Tagliaferri, G||Cominsky, LR||Giommi, P||Godet, O||Kennea, JA||Krimm, H||Angelini, L||Barthelmy, SD||Boyd, PT||Palmer, DM||Wells, AA||White, NE

publication date

  • August 2006

published in