A GRB 000301C Symphony

Telescopic instruments in Earth and space are still tracking a tremendous explosion that occurred across the universe. A nearly unprecedented symphony of international observations began abruptly on March 1 when Earth-orbiting RXTE [ http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/xte/xte_1st.html ], Sun-orbiting Ulysses [ http://helio.estec.esa.nl/ulysses/ ], and asteroid-orbiting NEAR [ http://near.jhuapl.edu/Education/intro/NEARintro.html ] all detected [ http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/gcn3/568.gcn3 ] a 10-second burst [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap991104.html ] of high-frequency gamma radiation [ http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/science/know_l1/emspectrum.html ]. Within 48 hours astronomers using the 2.5-meter Nordic Optical Telescope [ http://www.astro.lu.se/not.html ] chimed in with the observation of a middle-frequency optical counterpart [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970407.html ] that was soon confirmed with the 3.5-meter Calar Alto Telescope [ http://www.mpia-hd.mpg.de/Public/CAHA/ ] in Spain. By the next day the explosion was picked up in low-frequency radio waves [ http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/science/know_l2/emspectrum.html ] by the by the European IRAM [ http://www.iram.es/ ] 30-meter dish in Spain, and then by the VLA [ http://info.aoc.nrao.edu/doc/vla/html/VLAintro.shtml ] telescopes in the US. The Japanese 8-meter Subaru Telescope [ http://www.subaru.naoj.org/Introduction/outline.html ] interrupted a maiden engineering test [ http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/gcn3/577.gcn3 ] to trumpet in infrared [ http://www.ipac.caltech.edu/Outreach/Edu/discovery.html ] observations. Major telescopes across the globe soon began playing along as GRB 000301C came into view, detailing unusual behavior [ http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/gcn3/599.gcn3 ]. The Hubble Space Telescope [ http://www.stsci.edu/hst/ ] captured the above image [ http://www-int.stsci.edu/~fruchter/GRB/000301C/ ] and was the first to obtain [ http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/gcn3/603.gcn3 ] an accurate distance to the explosion, placing it near redshift 2, most of the way across the visible universe. The Keck II Telescope [ http://www2.keck.hawaii.edu:3636/realpublic/gen_info/gen_info.html ] in Hawaii quickly confirmed and refined [ http://gcn.gsfc.nasa.gov/gcn/gcn3/605.gcn3 ] the redshift. Still, no one is sure what type of explosion [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980508.html ] this was. The symphony is not over - oddly no host galaxy [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap990210.html ] appears near the position of this explosion. Will one appear as the din of the loud fireball fades [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970917.html ]?

Andrew Fruchter [ http://www.stsci.edu/~fruchter/ ] (STScI [ http://www.stsci.edu/ ]) et al. [ http://www-int.stsci.edu/~fruchter/GRB/000301C/part.html ], STIS [ http://hires.gsfc.nasa.gov/stis/stispage.html ], HST, NASA [ http://www.nasa.gov/ ]

OTs

Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC)

Earth

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap000314.html

SPD-APOD-ap000314