0000000000495256
AUTHOR
D. Guetta
The flaring afterglow of GRB 050730
We present a detailed spectral and temporal analysis of Swift and XMM-Newton observations of GRB 050730. The X-ray afterglow of GRB 050730 was found to decline with time with intense flaring activity superimposed. Evidence of flaring activity in the early UVOT optical afterglow, simultaneous with that observed in the X-ray band, was found. Strong spectral evolution in the X-ray energy band during the flaring activity was present.
GRB 050904 at redshift 6.3: observations of the oldest cosmic explosion after the Big Bang
We present optical and near-infrared observations of the afterglow of the gamma-ray burst GRB 050904. We derive a photometric redshift z = 6.3, estimated from the presence of the Lyman break falling between the I and J filters. This is by far the most distant GRB known to date. Its isotropic-equivalent energy is 3.4x10^53 erg in the rest-frame 110-1100 keV energy band. Despite the high redshift, both the prompt and the afterglow emission are not peculiar with respect to other GRBs. We find a break in the J-band light curve at t_b = 2.6 +- 1.0 d (observer frame). If we assume this is the jet break, we derive a beaming-corrected energy E_gamma = (4-12)x10^51 erg. This limit shows that GRB 050…