What we knew,what we know and what we will know about cosmic gamma-ray bursts

The paper is devoted to the present crisis in the field of cosmic gamma-ray bursts. There are two different paradigms of the phenomenon, which have practically equal numbers of supporters. The cosmological one associates bursts with collisions of compact objects at distances up to those with red-shifts of about 1–2. The galactic paradigm assumes that bursts are generated by neutron stars in the extended galactic halo. The present situation is shown to be very close to the ultimate establishment of the paradigm of the origin of cosmic gamma-ray bursts.     

New results on the time histories of gamma-ray bursts

A study of the morphology of 14 short ( 1 s) gamma ray bursts observed by the Franco Soviet SIGNE detectors onboard the VENERA spacecraft between 1978 and 1982 is presented. We find two major groups of short bursts characterised not only by their different durations ( 1 s and 100 ms respectively), but also by different e-folding rise and decay times. A study of the time history of the impulsive portion of the 1979 March 5 event at 2 ms resolution shows evidence for a previously undiscovered 23ms quasi periodicity. These results are discussed in the context of neutron star models for gamma ray bursters.     

Analysis of solar spike events by means of symbolic dynamics methods

We have searched for interrelations of spikes emitted simultaneously at different frequencies during the impulsive phase of flare events (Fig.1). As the spikes are related to the flare energy release and are interpreted as emissions that originate at different sites having different magnetic field strengths, any relation in frequency is interpretated as a relation in space. Quantities of symbolic dynamics, such as mutual information, Shannon information and algorithmic complexity are appropriate to characterize such spatiotemporal patterns, whereas the popular estimate of fractal dimensions can be applied to low-dimensional systems only.The goal is to decide between two possible types of fragmentation depending on the energy release and emission processes, which we callglobal andlocal organization. In the global organization the whole region becomes supercritical, and the energy is released in independent, small regions. The alternative local scenario requires a trigger that spreads from initial localized events and ignites nearby regions.Mutual information which is a generalization of correlation indicates a relation in frequency beyond the bandwidth of individual spikes. The scans in the spectrograms with large mutual information also show a low level of Shannon information and algorithmic complexity, indicating that the simultaneous appearance of spikes at other frequencies is not a completely stochastic phenomenon (white noise). It may be caused by a nonlinear deterministic system or by a Markov process. By means of mutual information we find a memory over frequency intervals up to 60 MHz (Fig. 2). Shannon information and algorithmic complexity, however, describe spike events as a whole, i.e. a global source region. A global organization is also apparent in quasi-periodic changes of the Shannon information and algorithmic complexity in the range of 2–8 seconds (Fig. 3).This findings is compatible with a scenario of local organization in which the information of one spike event spreads spatially and hence triggers further spike events at different places. The region is not an ensemble of independently flashing sources, each representing a system that cascades in energy after an initial trigger. On the contrary, there is a causal connection between the sources at any time.The analysis of four spike events suggests that the simultaneous appearance of spikes is not stochastically independent but a process in which spikes at nearby locations are simultaneously triggered by a common exciter.We have shown in the case in the case of spikes that quantities from nonlinear dynamics used in this paper are helpful in detecting structural properties of complex spatio-temporal patterns. This approach seems to be promising also for several other astrophysical applications.     

面向太空环境应用的抗辐照有源光纤特性研究

针对太空恶劣辐射环境会造成光器件的光学性能下降或失效的问题,利用改良化学气相沉积法(MCVD)结合原子层沉积(ALD)掺杂技术制备铋铒共掺光纤(BEDF)和掺铒光纤(EDF),经不同辐照剂量的伽马射线处理后,对它们的光谱特性进行对比研究。光纤样品分别经0.3kGy、0.5kGy、0.8kGy和1.5kGy辐照处理,对比光谱发现BEDF的辐照诱导损耗(RIA)的增幅明显低于EDF,特别是经1.5kGy的辐照处理后,EDF的RIA比BEDF高1.93dB/m。EDF的荧光强度随辐照剂量的增加而降低,且低于未辐照前的荧光强度;而对于BEDF而言,其荧光强度随辐照剂量的增加先增加后减弱,且均高于未辐照的荧光强度。实验结果表明,BEDF具有一定抗辐照特性,对应用于太空环境具有重要研究意义。