An inverse Compton origin for the 55 GeV photon in the late afterglow of GRB 130907A

Abstract

The extended high-energy gamma-ray (>100 MeV) emission which occurs well after the prompt gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) is usually explained as the afterglow synchrotron radiation. Here we report the analysis of the Fermi Large Area Telescope observations of GRB 130907A. A 55 GeV photon compatible with the position of the burst was found at about 5 hours after the prompt phase. The probability that this photon is associated with GRB 130907A is higher than 99.96%. The energy of this photon exceeds the maximum synchrotron photon energy at this time and its occurrence thus challenges the synchrotron mechanism as the origin for the extended high-energy >10 GeV emission. Modeling of the broad-band spectral energy distribution suggests that such high energy photons can be produced by the synchrotron self-Compton emission of the afterglow.

13 pages, 2 figures, ApJ, in press, typos have been corrected in this version

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• Searching for an additional high-energy component in Fermi-LAT GRB afterglows