Dust-scattering rings of GRB 221009A as seen by the Neil Gehrels Swift satellite: can we count them all?

Abstract

We present the first results for the dust-scattering rings of GRB 221009A, coined as the GRB of the century, as observed by the Neil Gehrels Swift satellite. We perform analysis of both time resolved observations and stacked data. The former approach enable us to study the expansion of the most prominent rings, associate their origin with the prompt X-ray emission of the GRB and determine the location of the dust layers. The stacked radial profiles increase the signal-to-noise ratio of the data and allows detection of fainter and overlapping peaks in the angular profile. We find a total of 16 dust concentrations (with hints of even more) that span about 15 kpc in depth and could be responsible for the highly structured X-ray angular profiles. By comparing the relative scattered fluxes of the five most prominent rings we show that the layer with the largest amount of dust is located at about 0.44 kpc away from us. We finally compare the location of the dust layers with results from experiments that study the 3D structure of our Galaxy via extinction or CO radio observations, and highlight the complementarity of dust X-ray tomography to these approaches.

12 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS. New version contains updated tables/figures after correction of a numerical error

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• GRB 221009A: Discovery of an Exceptionally Rare Nearby and Energetic Gamma-Ray Burst
• The power of the rings: the GRB 221009A soft X-ray emission from its dust-scattering halo
• Swift/UVOT: 18 Years of Long GRB Discoveries and Advances
• Probing the interstellar medium toward GRB 221009A through X-ray dust scattering
• Expansion and Spectral Softening of the Dust Scattering Rings of GRB 221009A
• The optical constants and grain sizes of interstellar dust measured directly using the dust scattered x-ray halo of GRB 221009A