The continuum spectral characteristics of gamma-ray bursts observed by BATSE
Abstract
Distributions of the continuum spectral characteristics of 260 bursts in the first BATSE catalog are presented. The data are derived from flux ratios calculated from the BATSE Large Area Detector (LAD) four-channel discriminator data. The data are converted from counts to photons using a direct spectral inversion technique to remove the effects of atmospheric scattering and the energy dependence of the detector angular response. Although there are intriguing clusterings of bursts in the spectral hardness ratio distributions, no evidence for the presence of distinct burst classes based on spectral hardness ratios alone is found. All subsets of bursts selected for their spectral characteristics in this analysis exhibit spatial distributions consistent with isotropy. The spectral diversity of the burst population appears to be caused largely by the highly variable nature of the burst production mechanisms themselves.
- Publication:
-
The Astrophysical Journal
- Pub Date:
- August 1994
- DOI:
- 10.1086/174495
- Bibcode:
- 1994ApJ...431..416P
- Keywords:
-
- Continuous Spectra;
- Gamma Ray Bursts;
- Gamma Ray Spectra;
- Photons;
- Sky Surveys (Astronomy);
- Astrophysics;
- Fluence;
- Gamma Ray Astronomy;
- Spatial Distribution;
- Spectrum Analysis;
- Astrophysics