HIGH-REDSHIFT STARBURSTING DWARF GALAXIES REVEALED BY Γ-Ray BURST AFTERGLOWS

Chen, Hsiao‐Wen; Perley, D.; Pollack, L. K.; Prochaska, J. Xavier; Bloom, J.; Dessauges‐Zavadsky, M.; Pettini, Max; López, Sebastián; Dall'Aglio, Aldo; Becker, George D.

doi:10.1088/0004-637x/691/1/152

Cited by 89 publications

(126 citation statements)

References 135 publications

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“…This hypothesis could be also supported by the results recently obtained by (Chen et al 2009). These authors analyzed 7 GRB fields and found the presence of at least one addition object at angular separation from the GRB afterglow position in all the four fields of GRBs with known intervening strong MgII galaxies.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 85%

Statistics and characteristics of MgII absorbers along GRB lines of sight observed with VLT-UVES

Vergani

Petitjean

Ledoux

et al. 2009

A&A

105

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We analyze the properties of Mg ii absorption systems detected along the sightlines toward GRBs using a sample of 10 GRB afterglow spectra obtained with VLT-UVES over the past six years. The signal-to-noise ratio is high enough that we can extend previous studies to smaller equivalent widths (typically W r > 0.3 Å). Over a pathlength of Δz ∼ 14, we detect 9 intervening Mg ii systems with W r > 1 Å and 9 weaker MgII systems (0.3 < W r < 1.0 Å) when about 4 and 7, respectively, are expected from observations of QSO sightlines. The number of weak absorbers is similar along GRB and QSO lines of sight, while the number of strong systems is higher along GRB lines of sight with a 2σ significance. Using intermediate and low-resolution observations reported in the literature, we increase the absorption length for strong systems to Δz = 31.5 (about twice the path length of previous studies) and find that the number density of strong Mg ii systems is a factor of 2.1 ± 0.6 higher (about 3σ significance) toward GRBs than towards QSOs, about twice less, however, than previously reported. We divide the sample into three redshift bins and find that the number density of strong Mg ii is greater in the low-redshift bins. We investigate in detail the properties of strong Mg ii systems observed with UVES, deriving an estimate of both the H i column density and the associated extinction. Both the estimated dust extinction in strong GRB Mg ii systems and the equivalent width distribution are consistent with what is observed for standard QSO systems. We also find that the number density of (sub)-DLAs per unit redshift in the UVES sample is probably twice more than what is expected from QSO sightlines, which confirms the peculiarity of GRB lines of sight. These results indicate that neither a dust extinction bias nor different beam sizes of the sources are viable explanations for the excess. It is still possible that the current sample of GRB lines of sight is biased by a subtle gravitational lensing effect. More data and larger samples are needed to test this hypothesis.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 85%

Statistics and characteristics of MgII absorbers along GRB lines of sight observed with VLT-UVES

Vergani

Petitjean

Ledoux

et al. 2009

A&A

105

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“…They are also considered to be the building blocks of much larger and more metalrich galaxies (Review by Tosi 2003). They also show analogies with Gamma Ray Bursts (GRB) hosts whose ISM usually exhibit moderate chemical enrichment with a median metallicity of 1/10 Z (Chen et al 2009). …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Probing the dust properties of galaxies up to submillimetre wavelengths

Galametz¹,

Madden²,

Galliano³

et al. 2009

A&A

200

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Aims. We study the dust properties of four low metallicity galaxies by modelling their spectral energy distributions. This modelling enables us to constrain the dust properties such as the mass, the temperature or the composition to characterise the global ISM properties in dwarf galaxies. Methods. We present 870 μm images of four low metallicity galaxies (NGC 1705, Haro 11, Mrk 1089 and UM 311) observed with the Large APEX BOlometer CAmera (LABOCA) on the Atacama Pathfinder EXperiment (APEX) telescope. We modeled their spectral energy distributions combining the submm observations of LABOCA, 2MASS, IRAS, Spitzer photometric data, and the IRS data for Haro 11. Results. We found that the PAH mass abundance is very low in these galaxies, 5 to 50 times lower than the PAH mass fraction of our Galaxy. We also found that a significant mass of dust is revealed when using submm constraints compared to that measured with only mid-IR to far-IR observations extending only to 160 μm. For NGC 1705 and Haro 11, an excess in submillimeter wavelengths was detected when we used our standard dust SED model. We rerun our SED procedure adding a cold dust component (10 K) to better describe the high 870 μm flux derived from LABOCA observations, which significantly improves the fit. We found that at least 70% of the dust mass of these two galaxies can reside in a cold dust component. We also showed that the subsequent dust-to-gas mass ratios, considering HI and CO observations, can be strikingly high for Haro 11 in comparison with what is usually expected for these low-metallicity environments. Furthermore, we derived the star formation rate of our galaxies and compared them to the Schmidt law. Haro 11 falls anomalously far from the Schmidt relation. These results may suggest that a reservoir of hidden gas could be present in molecular form not traced by the current CO observations. While there can be a significant cold dust mass found in Haro 11, the SED peaks at exceptionally short wavelengths (36 μm), also highlighting the importance of the much warmer dust component heated by the massive star clusters in Haro 11. We also derived the total IR luminosities derived from our models and compared them with relations that derive this luminosity from Spitzer bands. We found that the Draine & Li (2007) formula compares well to our direct IR determinations.

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“…So far, there are only eight bursts with z > 3 where the detection of a host galaxy has been published, namely GRB 971214 (z = 3.418, Kulkarni et al 1998), GRB 000131 (z = 4.500, Andersen et al 2000;Fruchter et al 2006), GRB 030323 (z = 3.3718, Vreeswijk et al 2004), GRB 060206 (z = 4.04795, Fynbo et al 2006;Thöne et al 2008;Chen at al. 2009), GRB 060210 (z = 3.9133, Fynbo et al 2009;Perley et al 2009), GRB 060605 (z = 3.773, Ferrero et al 2009), GRB 090205 (z = 4.6503, D'Avanzo et al 2010, and GRB 090323 (z = 3.568, Cenko et al 2010;McBreen et al 2010).…”

Section: Host Searchmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…2009), GRB 060210 (z = 3.9133, Fynbo et al 2009;Perley et al 2009), GRB 060605 (z = 3.773, Ferrero et al 2009), GRB 090205 (z = 4.6503, D'Avanzo et al 2010, and GRB 090323 (z = 3.568, Cenko et al 2010;McBreen et al 2010). The host galaxies of GRB 020124 (Berger et al 2002;Chen at al. 2009), GRB 050730, GRB 050908, GRB 060607A, GRB 070721B (all Chen at al.…”

Section: Host Searchmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Photometry and spectroscopy of GRB 060526: a detailed study of the afterglow and host galaxy of az = 3.2 gamma-ray burst

Thöne

Канн²,

Jóhannesson

et al. 2010

A&A

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Aims. With this paper we want to investigate the highly variable afterglow light curve and environment of gamma-ray burst (GRB) 060526 at z = 3.221. Methods. We present one of the largest photometric datasets ever obtained for a GRB afterglow, consisting of multi-color photometric data from the ultraviolet to the near infrared. The data set contains 412 data points in total to which we add additional data from the literature. Furthermore, we present low-resolution high signal-to-noise spectra of the afterglow. The afterglow light curve is modeled with both an analytical model using broken power law fits and with a broad-band numerical model which includes energy injections. The absorption lines detected in the spectra are used to derive column densities using a multi-ion single-component curve-of-growth analysis from which we derive the metallicity of the host of GRB 060526. Results. The temporal behaviour of the afterglow follows a double broken power law with breaks at t = 0.090 ± 0.005 and t = 2.401 ± 0.061 days. It shows deviations from the smooth set of power laws that can be modeled by additional energy injections from the central engine, although some significant microvariability remains. The broadband spectral-energy distribution of the afterglow shows no significant extinction along the line of sight. The metallicity derived from S ii and Fe ii of [S/H] = -0.57 ± 0.25 and [Fe/H] = -1.09 ± 0.24 is relatively high for a galaxy at that redshift but comparable to the metallicity of other GRB hosts at similar redshifts. At the position of the afterglow, no host is detected to F775W(AB) = 28.5 mag with the HST, implying an absolute magnitude of the host M(1500 Å) > -18.3 mag which is fainter than most long-duration hosts, although the GRB may be associated with a faint galaxy at a distance of 11 kpc.

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HIGH-REDSHIFT STARBURSTING DWARF GALAXIES REVEALED BY Γ-Ray BURST AFTERGLOWS

Cited by 89 publications

References 135 publications

Statistics and characteristics of MgII absorbers along GRB lines of sight observed with VLT-UVES

Statistics and characteristics of MgII absorbers along GRB lines of sight observed with VLT-UVES

Probing the dust properties of galaxies up to submillimetre wavelengths

Photometry and spectroscopy of GRB 060526: a detailed study of the afterglow and host galaxy of az = 3.2 gamma-ray burst

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