Radio scintillation of gamma-ray-burst afterglows

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Abstract

Stars twinkle to the eye through atmospheric turbulence, but planets, because of their larger angular size, do not. Similarly, scintillation due to the local interstellar medium will modulate the radio flux of gamma-ray-burst afterglows and may permit indirect measurements of their angular sizes. The amplitude of refractive scintillation is of order ten percent at ten gigahertz unless the source size is much larger than the expected size, of order microarcseconds. Diffractive scintillation is marginally possible, depending sensitively on the source size, observing frequency, and scattering measure of the interstellar medium.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)449-460
Number of pages12
JournalNew Astronomy
Volume2
Issue number5
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 1997

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Instrumentation
  • Astronomy and Astrophysics
  • Space and Planetary Science

Keywords

  • Gamma rays: bursts
  • ISM: structure
  • Scattering
  • Techniques: interferometric

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