Repeated injections of energy in the first 600 ms of the giant flare of SGR 1806-20

Toshio Terasawa; Yasuyuki T. Tanaka; Yasuhiro Takei; Nobuyuki Kawal; Atsumasa Yoshida; Ken'ichi Nomoto; Ichiro Yoshikawa; Yoshifumi Saito; Yasumasa Kasaba; Takeshi Takashima; Toshifumi Mukai; Hirotomo Noda; Toshio Murakami; Kyoko Watanabe; Yasushi Muraki; Takaaki Yokoyama; Masahiro Hoshino

doi:10.1038/nature03573

Repeated injections of energy in the first 600 ms of the giant flare of SGR 1806-20

Toshio Terasawa, Yasuyuki T. Tanaka, Yasuhiro Takei, Nobuyuki Kawal, Atsumasa Yoshida, Ken'ichi Nomoto, Ichiro Yoshikawa, Yoshifumi Saito, Yasumasa Kasaba, Takeshi Takashima, Toshifumi Mukai, Hirotomo Noda, Toshio Murakami, Kyoko Watanabe, Yasushi Muraki, Takaaki Yokoyama, Masahiro Hoshino

SCI - Planetary Plasma and Atmospheric Research Center (PPARC)

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

137 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The massive flare of 27 December 2004 from the soft γ-ray repeater SGR 1806-20, a possible magnetar, saturated almost all γ-ray detectors, meaning that the profile of the pulse was poorly characterized. An accurate profile is essential to determine physically what was happening at the source. Here we report the unsaturated γ-ray profile for the first 600 ms of the flare, with a time resolution of 5.48 ms. The peak of the profile (of the order of 10⁷ photons cm^-2s^-1) was reached ∼50 ms after the onset of the flare, and was then followed by a gradual decrease with superposed oscillatory modulations possibly representing repeated energy injections with ∼60-ms intervals. The implied total energy is comparable to the stored magnetic energy in a magnetar (∼10⁴⁷ erg) based on the dipole magnetic field intensity (∼10¹⁵ G), suggesting either that the energy release mechanism was extremely efficient or that the interior magnetic field is much stronger than the external dipole field.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	1110-1111
Number of pages	2
Journal	Nature
Volume	434
Issue number	7037
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/nature03573
Publication status	Published - 2005 Apr 28

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Terasawa, T., Tanaka, Y. T., Takei, Y., Kawal, N., Yoshida, A., Nomoto, K., Yoshikawa, I., Saito, Y., Kasaba, Y., Takashima, T., Mukai, T., Noda, H., Murakami, T., Watanabe, K., Muraki, Y., Yokoyama, T., & Hoshino, M. (2005). Repeated injections of energy in the first 600 ms of the giant flare of SGR 1806-20. Nature, 434(7037), 1110-1111. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature03573

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title = "Repeated injections of energy in the first 600 ms of the giant flare of SGR 1806-20",

abstract = "The massive flare of 27 December 2004 from the soft γ-ray repeater SGR 1806-20, a possible magnetar, saturated almost all γ-ray detectors, meaning that the profile of the pulse was poorly characterized. An accurate profile is essential to determine physically what was happening at the source. Here we report the unsaturated γ-ray profile for the first 600 ms of the flare, with a time resolution of 5.48 ms. The peak of the profile (of the order of 107 photons cm-2s-1) was reached ∼50 ms after the onset of the flare, and was then followed by a gradual decrease with superposed oscillatory modulations possibly representing repeated energy injections with ∼60-ms intervals. The implied total energy is comparable to the stored magnetic energy in a magnetar (∼1047 erg) based on the dipole magnetic field intensity (∼1015 G), suggesting either that the energy release mechanism was extremely efficient or that the interior magnetic field is much stronger than the external dipole field.",

author = "Toshio Terasawa and Tanaka, {Yasuyuki T.} and Yasuhiro Takei and Nobuyuki Kawal and Atsumasa Yoshida and Ken'ichi Nomoto and Ichiro Yoshikawa and Yoshifumi Saito and Yasumasa Kasaba and Takeshi Takashima and Toshifumi Mukai and Hirotomo Noda and Toshio Murakami and Kyoko Watanabe and Yasushi Muraki and Takaaki Yokoyama and Masahiro Hoshino",

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AU - Terasawa, Toshio

AU - Tanaka, Yasuyuki T.

AU - Takei, Yasuhiro

AU - Kawal, Nobuyuki

AU - Yoshida, Atsumasa

AU - Nomoto, Ken'ichi

AU - Yoshikawa, Ichiro

AU - Saito, Yoshifumi

AU - Kasaba, Yasumasa

AU - Takashima, Takeshi

AU - Mukai, Toshifumi

AU - Noda, Hirotomo

AU - Murakami, Toshio

AU - Watanabe, Kyoko

AU - Muraki, Yasushi

AU - Yokoyama, Takaaki

AU - Hoshino, Masahiro

PY - 2005/4/28

Y1 - 2005/4/28

N2 - The massive flare of 27 December 2004 from the soft γ-ray repeater SGR 1806-20, a possible magnetar, saturated almost all γ-ray detectors, meaning that the profile of the pulse was poorly characterized. An accurate profile is essential to determine physically what was happening at the source. Here we report the unsaturated γ-ray profile for the first 600 ms of the flare, with a time resolution of 5.48 ms. The peak of the profile (of the order of 107 photons cm-2s-1) was reached ∼50 ms after the onset of the flare, and was then followed by a gradual decrease with superposed oscillatory modulations possibly representing repeated energy injections with ∼60-ms intervals. The implied total energy is comparable to the stored magnetic energy in a magnetar (∼1047 erg) based on the dipole magnetic field intensity (∼1015 G), suggesting either that the energy release mechanism was extremely efficient or that the interior magnetic field is much stronger than the external dipole field.

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Repeated injections of energy in the first 600 ms of the giant flare of SGR 1806-20

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