Abstract
THE observed time structures of γ-ray bursts of the type reported by Klebesadel et al.1 place an upper limit l ≈ 109cm on the typical size of the burst source regions2. If the sources were too far away and isotropically radiating then the observations would require such a high density of photons that the sources would be optically thick in the MeV region simply due to γ-γ-pair production. These considerations do not apply directly to highly beamed sources or relativistically expanding sources. I point out here that MeV photons have actually been observed in bursts, and that this means that non-relativistic sources cannot be further away than a few kpc from the Sun and therefore must be galactic.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 51 print issues and online access
$199.00 per year
only $3.90 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Klebesadel, R. W., Strong, I. B. & Olson, R. A. Astrophys. J. Lett. 182, L85–L88 (1973).
Rudermann, M. Annls New York Acad. Sci. 262, 164–180 (1975).
Metzger, A. E., Parker, R. H., Gilman, D., Peterson, L. E. & Trombka, J. I. Astrophys. J. Lett. 194, L19–L25 (1974).
Cline, T. L. & Desai, U. D. Astrophys J. Lett. 196, L43–L46 (1975).
Herzo, D., Zych, A. D. & White, R. S. Astrophys. J. Lett. 203, L115–L118 (1976).
Wheaton, W. A. et al. Astrophys. J. Lett. 185, L57–L61 (1973).
Imhof, W. L. et al. Astrophys. J. Lett. 198, 717–725 (1975).
Sommer, M., Müller, D., Horstman, H. & Bassani, L. 15th Int. Cosmic Ray Conference, Conference Papers 1, 173–178 (1977).
Ramaty, R. & Cohen, J. M. Proceedings of the Conference on Transient Cosmic γ-ray Sources (Los Alamos Report LA-5505-C) 147–156 (1974).
Nikishov, A. I. Soviet Phys. JETP 14, 393–394 (1962).
Fazio, G. G. & Stecker, F. W. Nature 226, 135–136 (1970).
Jelley, J. V. Nature 211, 472–475 (1966).
McBreen, B. Nature 224, 893 (1969).
Stecker, F. W. & Tsuruta, S. Nature phys. Sci. 235, 8–9 (1972).
Rengarajan, T. N. Nature 248, 569–571 (1974).
Herterich, K. Nature 250, 311–313 (1974).
Gould, R. J. & Schréder, G. P. Phys. Res. 155, 1404–1407 (1967).
Jauch, J. M. & Rohrlich, F. Theory of Photons and Electrons, 299–301 (Addison Wesley, Reading, Massachussets, 1955).
Pollack, J. B., Guthrie, P. D. & Shen, B. S. P. Astrophys. J. Lett. 169, L113–L116 (1971).
Schmidt, M. Galactic Structure (eds. Blaauw. A. & Schmidt, M.) 513–530 (University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1965).
Gordon, M. A. & Burton, W. B. Astrophys. J. 208, 346–353 (1976).
Strong, I. B., Klebesadel, R. W. & Evans, W. D. Annls N. Y. Acad. Sci. 262, 145–158 (1975).
Cline, T. L., Desai, U. D., Schmidt, W. K. H. & Teegarden, B. J. Nature 266, 694–696 (1977).
Burbidge, G. R., Kahn, F. D., Ebert, R., Hoerner, S. V. & St Temesvàry Die Entstehung von Sternen durch Kondensation diffuser Materie, 261–263 (Springer, Berlin, 1960).
McLaughlin, D. B. Pop. Astr. 47, 538–549 (1939).
Payne-Gaposchkin, C. Variable Stars and Galactic Structure, 56 (Athlone, London 1954).
Arp, H. C. Astr. J. 61, 15–34 (1968).
Sharov, A. S. Astron. Zh. 45, 335–342 (1968), (Soviet. Astron. AJ 12, 265–270 (1968).
Strong, I. B., Klebesadel, R. W. & Olson, R. A. Astrophys. J. Lett. 188, L1–L3 (1974).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
SCHMIDT, W. Distance limit for a class of model γ-ray burst sources. Nature 271, 525–527 (1978). https://doi.org/10.1038/271525a0
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/271525a0
This article is cited by
-
Relativity at action or gamma-ray Bursts
General Relativity and Gravitation (1996)
-
Comptel analysis of GRB 940217
Astrophysics and Space Science (1995)
-
Analysis of COMPTEL gamma-ray burst locations and spectra
Astrophysics and Space Science (1995)
Comments
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.
