GRB 120804A
GCN Circular 13841
Subject
GRB 120804A: Late-time Chandra observation
Date
2012-10-04T17:56:15Z (13 years ago)
From
David Burrows at PSU/Swift <dnburrows@gmail.com>
GRB 120804A: Late-time Chandra observation
David N. Burrows (PSU), Bin-Bin Zhang (PSU) and Eleonora Troja
(NASA/GSFC/UMCP) report:
We re-observed the field of GRB 120804A (Lien et al., GCN Circ. 13573)
with the Chandra ACIS instrument, starting on September 18, 2012
16:04:50 UT (~46 days after the GRB trigger), for a total exposure of
60 ks. The X-ray afterglow is clearly detected at the 10 sigma level.
The inferred flux is consistent with an extrapolation of
the earlier Swift XRT observations (Troja et al., GCN Circ. 13640) and the
XMM observation (Margutti et al. (GCN Circ. 13715), and shows a
continuing decline in flux with a power-law decay slope of ~1.0 and
no evidence for a jet break, consistent with Berger et al. (arXiv:1209:5423).
We thank Dan Schwartz and the entire Chandra staff for
rapidly executing this observation.
GCN Circular 13715
Subject
XMM observations of the short GRB120804A
Date
2012-09-05T19:53:38Z (13 years ago)
From
Raffaella Margutti at Harvard <raffaella.margutti@gmail.com>
R. Margutti (Harvard), V. Mangano (INAF IASF-Palermo), E. Berger, and W.
Fong (Harvard) report:
"We observed the short GRB120804A (GCN 13573) with XMM-Newton
starting on 2012 August 22, 21:51:29 UT (18.8 days after the burst).
GRB120804A is clearly detected at a level of 6 sigma with count-rate of
(4.3 +\- 0.7)e-3 cps (0.2-10 keV) in the pn. The pn net exposure time is
25.5 ks.
Using our best estimate of the intrinsic neutral hydrogen absorption
(NH_int=3.2e21 cm-2) and the Galactic absorption in the direction of the
burst (NH_gal=9.3e20 cm-2, Kalberla et al., 2005), this translates into
an unabsorbed 0.3-10 keV flux of 2.4e-14 erg/s/cm2. Our analysis
does not support the presence of a jet break for t< 18.8 days.
Combining the Swift-XRT (GCN 13580), Chandra (GCN 13640, 13643) and
XMM observations, for t>10^4 s the X-ray afterglow of GRB120804A is
best modeled by a simple power-law decay with index=1.0 +\- 0.1.
We thank the XMM-Newton staff for approving this observation."
GCN Circular 13643
Subject
GRB 120804A: Possible temporal break in the X-ray light-curve
Date
2012-08-14T20:56:06Z (13 years ago)
From
Wen-fai Fong at CFA <wfong@cfa.harvard.edu>
R. Margutti, W. Fong, and E. Berger (Harvard) report:
"We analyzed the Swift-XRT and Chandra observations of the short GRB
120804A (Lien et al. GCN 13573; Troja et al., GCN 13640). Using the data at
t>10^4 sec, when the light curve appears less susceptible to variability,
we find moderate evidence for a temporal break with a pre-break index of
alpha1= 0.7 +\- 0.1, a post-break index of alpha2= 1.9 +\- 0.5, and a break
time of about 2x10^5 sec. The F-test indicates 5% probability of chance
improvement with respect to a single power-law fit. Plots are available
from:
https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/~rmargutt/flux_lightcurvefitBPL.pdf
https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/~rmargutt/flux_lightcurvefitSPL.pdf
Further X-ray observations are required to clarify the nature/presence of
the temporal break."
GCN Circular 13640
Subject
GRB120804A: Chandra observations and afterglow detection
Date
2012-08-14T12:30:14Z (13 years ago)
From
Eleonora Troja at GSFC <eleonora.troja@nasa.gov>
E. Troja (NASA/GSFC/UMCP), T. Sakamoto (NASA/GSFC/UMCB),
N. Gehrels (NASA/GSFC), D. Donato (NASA/GSFC/UMCP),
and J. L. Racusin (NASA/GSFC) report:
We observed the field of GRB 120804A (Lien et al., GCN Circ. 13573) with
the Chandra ACIS-S starting on August 13, 2012 10:52:08 UT (~9.4 d after
the GRB trigger) for a total exposure of 19.8 ks. Within the Swift/XRT
enhanced position (Osborne et al., GCN Circ. 13577) we clearly detect a
source at Ra, Dec = 233.94786, -28.7823 which is equivalent to:
RA (J2000) = 15h 35m 47.49s
Dec (J2000) = -28d 46' 56.3"
with an uncertainty of 0.6 arcsec (radius, sys+stat, 90% containment).
This position is consistent with the putative host galaxy S1
(Chornock et al., GCN Circ. 13586).
The X-ray afterglow is detected at a count rate of (1.6 +/- 0.3)E-03 cts/s
(0.5-8.0 keV). By using the spectral parameters derived from the Swift/XRT
observations (Stroh et al., GCN Circ. 13580) we estimate an observed X-ray
flux of (1.5 +/-0.3)E-14 erg/cm2/s in the 0.3-10 keV energy band.
Our measurement is consistent with the power-law decay of ~1.1 reported
by Stroh et al. (GCN Circ. 13580), and sets a lower limit to the jet-break
time of t_j>9 d.
We thank Harvey Tananbaum and the entire Chandra staff for approving and
rapidly executing this observation.
GCN Circular 13614
Subject
GRB 120804A: Konus-Wind and Swift/BAT joint spectral analysis
Date
2012-08-09T19:48:56Z (13 years ago)
From
Valentin Pal'shin at Ioffe Inst <val@mail.ioffe.ru>
T. Sakamoto (GSFC/UMBC), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC),
W. Baumgartner (GSFC/UMBC), J. Cummings (GSFC/UMBC),
E. Fenimore (LANL), N. Gehrels (GSFC), H. Krimm (GSFC/USRA),
C. Markwardt (GSFC/UMD), D. Palmer (LANL), G. Sato (ISAS),
M. Stamatikos (OSU), J. Tueller (GSFC), and T. Ukwatta (MSU)
on behalf of the Swift-BAT team,
V. Pal'shin, S. Golenetskii, R.Aptekar, E. Mazets, D. Frederiks, and
T. Cline on behalf of the Konus-Wind team,
report:
The short GRB 120804A (Swift/BAT trigger #529686: Lien et al., GCN Circ.
13573, Baumgartner et al. GCN Circ. 13581) triggered Konus-Wind at
T0=3255.749 s UT (00:54:15.749), but since the incident angle on the
triggered detector was 99.2 deg (i.e. the burst accidentally triggered
the S2 detector which observes the northern ecliptic hemisphere,
although the burst came from the southern ecliptic hemisphere: b = -9.2
deg) the standard analysis of the Konus-Wind spectral data is impossible.
To derive the broad-band spectral parameters of this burst, we performed
joint spectral analysis of the Swift/BAT data and the Konus-Wind
3-channel spectral data (obtained in the waiting mode from the detector
S1), which covers the energy range from 24 keV to 1.4 MeV.
The time intervals of the spectral data are chosen for the Konus-Wind
from T0(BAT)-0.916 s to T0(BAT)+2.028 s (single KW bin which comprises
the burst) and for the Swift/BAT from T0(BAT)-0.16 s to T0(BAT)+0.83 s
(that is the BAT T100 interval), where T0(BAT) is the trigger time of
BAT at 00:54:14.18 UTC. The energy ranges which we used in the joint
spectral analysis are 24-1400 keV and 14-150 keV for the Konus-Wind and
the Swift/BAT respectively. The spectral data of the two instruments
are fitted with the spectral model multiplied by a constant factor to
take into account the systematic effective area uncertainties in the
response matrices of each instrument and the difference in the chosen
intervals.
The spectrum is well fitted with a power-law with exponential cutoff
model: dN/dE ~ E^{alpha}*exp(-(2+alpha)*E/Epeak). No systematic residual
from the best fit model is seen in the spectral data of each instrument.
The best fit spectral parameters are: alpha = -0.89 (-0.28, +0.24) and
Epeak = 135 (-29, +66) keV (chi2/dof = 56/58).
The energy fluence and 16-ms peak flux in the 15-1000 keV band
are 1.45 (-0.31,+0.30) x 10^-6 erg/cm2 and (6.0 �� 2.7) x 10^-6 erg/cm2/s
respectively.
The Konus-Wind light curve of this GRB is available at
http://www.ioffe.ru/LEA/GRBs/GRB120804_T03255/
All the quoted errors are at the 90% confidence level.
GCN Circular 13611
Subject
GRB 120804A: ATCA 34GHz upper limit
Date
2012-08-08T10:29:43Z (13 years ago)
From
Paul Hancock at U of Sydney <hancock@physics.usyd.edu.au>
P. Hancock, T. Murphy, B. Gaensler, M. Bell, D. Burlon (University of
Sydney/CAASTRO), A. de Ugarte Postigo (IAA-CSIC, DARK/NBI)
We observed GRB120804A (GCN 13573) with the Australia Telescope
Compact Array at 34GHz for 96 minutes centered on 04:35UT Aug 08 2012
(T0+4.15days).
We detect no radio source at the location of the GRB afterglow seen by
the EVLA (GCN 13587) and place a 3sigma upper limit of 120uJy on the
flux of an afterglow at 34GHz.
These observations were obtained as part of ATCA project C2689. We
thank the observatory staff for their support and scheduling the
observations. The Australia Telescope is funded by the Commonwealth of
Australia for operation as a National Facility managed by CSIRO.
GCN Circular 13606
Subject
GRB 120804A: Gemini-North detection of an optical afterglow and putative host galaxy
Date
2012-08-07T16:04:57Z (13 years ago)
From
Wen-fai Fong at CFA <wfong@cfa.harvard.edu>
W. Fong, R. Chornock, and E. Berger (Harvard) report:
"We re-observed the location of the short-duration GRB 120804A (GCN
13573) with the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph (GMOS) mounted on the
Gemini-North 8-meter telescope to check for the presence of a fading
optical source. We obtained 16x180-sec of i-band observations in good
seeing conditions (FWHM=0.65") starting on 2012 August 07.30 UT, 3.3
days after the BAT trigger and 3.0 days after our initial observations
(GCN 13586).
Digital image subtraction of the two GMOS epochs using the ISIS
software package reveals a fading source slightly offset from the
center of S1, suggesting this to be the optical afterglow of GRB
120804A. There are no additional residuals in or around the refined
XRT position (improved upon from GCN 13577;
http://www.swift.ac.uk/xrt_positions/00529686/). Both S1 and S2 appear
to be extended, indicating that S1 is likely to be the
host galaxy of GRB 120804A and S2 is likely unrelated to the GRB.
We thank the Gemini staff for their assistance with these
observations."
GCN Circular 13601
Subject
GRB 120804A: ATCA 34GHz upper limit
Date
2012-08-07T03:17:14Z (13 years ago)
From
Paul Hancock at U of Sydney <hancock@physics.usyd.edu.au>
P. Hancock, T. Murphy, B. Gaensler, M. Bell, D. Burlon (University of
Sydney/CAASTRO), A. de Ugarte Postigo (IAA-CSIC, DARK/NBI)
We observed GRB120804A (GCN 13573) with the Australia Telescope
Compact Array at 34GHz for 56 minutes centered on 04:35UT Aug 06 2012
(T0+2.15days).
We detect no radio source at the location of the GRB afterglow seen by
the EVLA (GCN 13587) and place a 3sigma upper limit of 200uJy on the
flux of an afterglow at 34GHz.
Further observations are planned.
These observations were obtained as part of ATCA project C2689. We
thank the observatory staff for their support and scheduling the
observations. The Australia Telescope is funded by the Commonwealth of
Australia for operation as a National Facility managed by CSIRO.
[GCN OPS NOTE(07aug12): Per author's request, the "120824A" in the Subject-line
was changed to "120804A".]
GCN Circular 13587
Subject
GRB 120804A: EVLA Detection
Date
2012-08-05T15:06:22Z (13 years ago)
From
Ashley Zauderer at CfA <bevinashley@gmail.com>
W. Fong, A. Zauderer, E. Berger (Harvard) report on behalf of a larger
collaboration:
"We observed the position of the short GRB 120804A (Lien et al., GCN
13573) with the EVLA at 5.8 GHz beginning 2012 Aug 4.97 UT (dt=0.93 d
after the trigger). We detect a radio source within the Swift-XRT error
circle (Osborne et al., GCN 13577) at the position
RA 15:35:47.49 (+/- 0.01)
Dec -28:46:56.7 (+/- 0.1)
Followup observations are planned."
GCN Circular 13586
Subject
GRB 120804A: Gemini-North observations
Date
2012-08-05T05:57:28Z (13 years ago)
From
Ryan Chornock at Harvard <rchornock@cfa.harvard.edu>
R. Chornock and E. Berger (Harvard) report on behalf of a larger
collaboration:
We observed the position of the X-ray afterglow of the short GRB 120804A
(Lien et al., GCN 13573) using GMOS on the Gemini-North 8-m telescope.
Observations began at 05:47 UT on 2012 August 4 (approximately 4.9 hours
after the BAT trigger). We obtained 11x180s of observations in both the
r and i filters. We find a pair of faint sources in the i band
observations within the enhanced XRT position (Osborne et al., GCN
13577) with coordinates (J2000):
S1: 15:35:47.48, -28:46:56.2
S2: 15:35:47.53, -28:46:57.6
with astrometric errors of about 0.3" relative to 2MASS. S1 is slightly
brighter than S2 in i. Neither source is detected in r. Further
observations are planned in order to search for variability of these
sources.
We thank the Gemini staff, particularly Chad Trujillo, for their
assistance with these observations.
GCN Circular 13585
Subject
GRB 120804A: Swift-BAT Spectral lag analysis
Date
2012-08-05T03:36:54Z (13 years ago)
From
Scott Barthelmy at NASA/GSFC <scott@lheamail.gsfc.nasa.gov>
J. Norris (BSU), N. Gehrels (GSFC), S. D. Barthelmy (GSFC)
We report the spectral lag analysis for GRB 120804A (GCN Circ. 13573