Grbs Research Paper

Gamma ray bursts (GRBs) are beams of energy in the form of gamma rays that are beamed out of the poles of a collapsing star, these are formed from very intense explosions in distant galaxies. GRBs are the brightest known electromagnetic events in the universe. They can last just a few milliseconds, or hours. The burst is often followed by an afterglow, which is emitted at longer wavelengths. We have been able to learn a lot of what we know about GRBs from afterglow. We can measure how far away the galaxy that the GRB came from is by the afterglow. GRB’s are commonly formed when a high energy star collapses and forms a neutron star, quark star, or a black hole. A typical 3-5 second GRB releases the same amount of energy that the sun will release in its 10 billion year lifetime. GRBs were first discovered in 1967 by vela satellites, which were designed to discover covert nuclear testing. The satellites picked up a burst of gamma rays unlike any nuclear weapon, so not feeling that the situation was urgent, …show more content…
Short bursts can last from a few milliseconds to a few seconds. Long bursts can last for a few minutes. Ultra long bursts can last for a few hours. 30% of GRBs are short burst, yet no afterglow had been successfully located from a short burst until 2005. These are the least studied GRBs due to their dim afterglow. Many short burst originate in areas with little or no star formation, distinguishing themselves from the other types of bursts. 70% of all GRBs are long bursts. These are more widely studied due to their bright afterglow. Most long GRBsn have been associated with galaxies with fast star formation, and core collapse, leading many to believe that these are caused from the death of stars. The last type of GRB is the ultra long burst. These last for more than 10,000 seconds, and are the most powerful GRBs. Some scientist think that these are formed by the collapse of a blue giant