Heavy-element production in a compact object merger observed by JWST.
Nature 626:8000 (2024) 737-741
Abstract:
The mergers of binary compact objects such as neutron stars and black holes are of central interest to several areas of astrophysics, including as the progenitors of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs)1, sources of high-frequency gravitational waves (GWs)2 and likely production sites for heavy-element nucleosynthesis by means of rapid neutron capture (the r-process)3. Here we present observations of the exceptionally bright GRB 230307A. We show that GRB 230307A belongs to the class of long-duration GRBs associated with compact object mergers4-6 and contains a kilonova similar to AT2017gfo, associated with the GW merger GW170817 (refs. 7-12). We obtained James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) mid-infrared imaging and spectroscopy 29 and 61 days after the burst. The spectroscopy shows an emission line at 2.15 microns, which we interpret as tellurium (atomic mass A = 130) and a very red source, emitting most of its light in the mid-infrared owing to the production of lanthanides. These observations demonstrate that nucleosynthesis in GRBs can create r-process elements across a broad atomic mass range and play a central role in heavy-element nucleosynthesis across the Universe.XMM-Newton-discovered Fast X-ray Transients: host galaxies and limits on contemporaneous detections of optical counterparts
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Oxford University Press (OUP) 527:4 (2023) 11823-11839
SN 2023emq: A Flash-ionized Ibn Supernova with Possible C iii Emission
The Astrophysical Journal Letters American Astronomical Society 959:1 (2023) l10
Modelling the spectra of the kilonova AT2017gfo – II: Beyond the photospheric epochs
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Oxford University Press (OUP) (2023) stad3688
Minutes-duration optical flares with supernova luminosities.
Nature 623:7989 (2023) 927-931