Gravitational Microlensing of Gamma-Ray Burst Afterglows by Single and Binary Stars | Zendy

Shude Mao | Zendy; Abraham Loeb | Zendy

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Gravitational Microlensing of Gamma-Ray Burst Afterglows by Single and Binary Stars

Author(s) -

Shude Mao,

Abraham Loeb

Publication year - 2001

Publication title -

the astrophysical journal

Language(s) - English

Resource type - Journals

SCImago Journal Rank - 2.376

H-Index - 489

eISSN - 1538-4357

pISSN - 0004-637X

DOI - 10.1086/318912

Subject(s) - gravitational microlensing , physics , light curve , gamma ray burst , astrophysics , afterglow , stars , brightness , astronomy , einstein ring , binary star , line of sight , magnification , gravitational lens , sky , optics , galaxy , redshift

We calculate the magnification light curves due to stellar microlensing ofgamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglows. A GRB source appears on the sky as a thinring which expands faster than the speed of light and is maximally magnified asit crosses the lens caustics. While a single star lens produces a single peakin the magnification light curve, binary star lenses may produce multiplepeaks. The shape of the magnification light curve provides invaluableinformation on the surface brightness distribution of the afterglow photosphereon sub micro-arcsecond scales. We find that all afterglows are likely to showvariability at the level of a few percent about a year following the explosion,due to stars which are separated by tens of Einstein radii from theirline-of-sight.Comment: slightly modified version, 14 pages, 4 figures, ApJL, in pres

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