Polarization and Light-Curve Variability: The "Patchy-Shell" Model | Zendy

Ehud Nakar | Zendy; Yonatan Oren | Zendy

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Polarization and Light-Curve Variability: The "Patchy-Shell" Model

Author(s) -

Ehud Nakar,

Yonatan Oren

Publication year - 2004

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 - 10.1086/382729

Subject(s) - light curve , afterglow , gamma ray burst , physics , polarization (electrochemistry) , astrophysics , computational physics , chemistry

Recent advances in early detection and detailed monitoring of GRB afterglowshave revealed variability in some afterglow light curves. One of the leadingmodels for this behavior is the patchy shell model. This model attributes thevariability to random angular fluctuations in the relativistic jet energy.These an-axisymmetric fluctuations should also impose variations in the degreeand angle of polarization that are correlated to the light curve variability.In this letter we present a solution of the light curve and polarizationresulting from a given spectrum of energy fluctuations. We compare light curvesproduced using this solution to the variable light curve of GRB 021004 and weshow that the main features in both the light curve and the polarizationfluctuations are very well reproduced by this model. We use our results to drawconstraints on the characteristics of the energy fluctuations that might havebeen present in GRB 021004.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures, Final version to appear in ApJ

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