The newly born magnetars powering gamma-ray burst internal-plateau emission: are there strange stars?

Abstract

The internal-plateau X-ray emission of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) indicates that a newly born magnetar could be the central object of some GRBs. The observed luminosity and duration of the plateaus suggest that, for such a magnetar, a rapid spin with a sub- or millisecond period is sometimes able to last thousands of seconds. In this case, the conventional neutron star (NS) model for the magnetar may be challenged, since the rapid spin of nascent NSs would be remarkably decelerated within hundreds of seconds due to r-mode instability. In contrast, the r-modes can be effectively suppressed in nascent strange stars (SSs). In other words, to a certain extent, only SSs can keep nearly-constant extremely-rapid spin for a long period of time during the early ages of the stars. We thus propose that the sample of the GRB rapidly-spinning magnetars can be used to test the SS hypothesis based on the distinct spin limits of NSs and SSs.

5 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ Letters

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Cited by in corpus (10)

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• Internal X-ray plateau in short GRBs: Signature of supramassive fast-rotating quark stars?
• The Most Luminous Supernova ASASSN-15lh: Signature of a Newborn Rapidly-Rotating Strange Quark Star
• The role of newly born magnetars in gamma-ray burst X-ray afterglow emission: Energy injection and internal emission
• Determining the efficiency of converting magnetar spin-down energy into gamma-ray burst X-ray afterglow emission and its possible implications
• On the properties of a newborn magnetar powering the X-ray transient CDF-S XT2
• Modeling the Multi-Band Afterglow of GRB 130831A: Evidence for a Spinning-Down Magnetar Dominated by Gravitational Wave Losses?
• The Prompt Emission of Gamma-Ray Bursts from the Wind of Newborn Millisecond Magnetars: A Case Study of GRB 160804A
• Evolution of newborn rapidly rotating magnetars: effects of r-mode and fall-back accretion
• A powerful e^{+-} outflow driven by a proto-strange quark star