"Self-absorbed" GeV light-curves of Gamma-Ray Burst afterglows

Abstract

We investigate the effect that the absorption of high-energy (above 100 MeV) photons produced in GRB afterglow shocks has on the light-curves and spectra of Fermi-LAT afterglows. Afterglows produced by the interaction of a relativistic outflow with a wind-like medium peak when the blast-wave deceleration sets in, and the afterglow spectrum could be hardening before that peak, as the optical thickness to pair-formation is decreasing. In contrast, in afterglows produced in the interaction with a homogeneous medium, the optical thickness to pair-formation should increase and yield a light-curve peak when it reaches unity, followed by a fast light-curve decay, accompanied by a spectral softening. If energy is injected in the blast-wave, then the accelerated increase of the optical thickness yields a convex afterglow light-curve. Other features, such as a double-peak light-curve or a broad hump, can arise from the evolution of the optical thickness to photon-photon absorption. Fast decays and convex light-curves are seen in a few LAT afterglows, but the expected spectral softening is rarely seen in (and difficult to measure with) LAT observations. Furthermore, for the effects of photon-photon attenuation to shape the high-energy afterglow light-curve without attenuating it too much, the ejecta initial Lorentz factor must be in a relatively narrow range (50-200), which reduces the chance of observing those effects.

8 pages, to appear in the ApJ

References in corpus (4)

• The First Fermi LAT Gamma-Ray Burst Catalog
• Multiwavelength observations of GRB 110731A: GeV emission from onset to afterglow
• Fermi observations of high-energy gamma-ray emission from GRB 090217A
• Fermi Large Area Telescope observations of GRB 110625A

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• Temporal Evolution of the Gamma-ray Burst Afterglow Spectrum for an Observer: GeV--TeV Synchrotron Self-Compton Light Curve
• The Polarization Dependence of Gamma-Gamma Absorption - Implications for Gamma-Ray Bursts and Blazars
• Optical Flashes from Internal Pairs Formed in Gamma-Ray Burst Afterglows
• Synchrotron and inverse-Compton emissions from pairs formed in GRB afterglows (analytical treatment)