Relationships between Relative Spectral Lags and Relative Widths of Gamma-ray Bursts

The phenomenon of gamma-ray burst (GRB) spectral lags is very common, but a definitive explanation has not yet been given. From a sample of 82 GRB pulses we find that the spectral lags are correlated with the pulse widths, however, there is no correlation be- tween the relative spectral lags and the relative pulse widths. We suspect that the correlations between spectral lags and pulse widths might be caused by the Lorentz factor of the GRBs concerned. Our analysis on the relative quantities suggests that the intrinsic spectral lag might reflect other aspect of pulses than the aspect associated with the dynamical time of shocks or that associated with the time delay due to the curvature effect.     

A One-Dimensional Relativistic Shock Model for the Light Curve of Gamma-ray Bursts

We investigate the forming of gamma-ray burst pulses with a simple one-dimensional relativistic shock model. The mechanism is that a "central engine" drives forward the nearby plasma inside the fireball to generate a series of pressure waves. We give a relativistic geometric recurrence formula that connects the time when the pressure waves are produced and the time when the corresponding shocks occurred. This relation enables us to relate the pulse magnitude with the observation time. Our analysis shows that the evolution of the pressure waves leads to a fast rise and an exponential decay pulses. In determining the width of the pulses, the acceleration time is more important than that of the deceleration.     

Short-Term Period Variation of Relative Sunspot Numbers

We use wavelet transform to analyze the daily relative sunspot number series over solar cycles 10-23. The characteristics of some of the periods shorter than ～ 600-day are discussed. The results exhibit not only the variation of some short periods in the 14 solar cy-cles but also the characteristics and differences around solar peaks and valley years. The short periodic components with larger amplitude such as ～27,～150 and ～360-day are obvious in some solar cycles,all of them are time-variable,also their lengths and amplitudes are vari-able and intermittent in time. The variable characteristics of the periods are rather different in different solar cycles.     

A Comparison of BBN,ADTree and MLP in separating Quasars from Large Survey Catalogues

We compare the performance of Bayesian Belief Networks (BBN), Multilayer Perception (MLP) networks and Alternating Decision Trees (ADtree) on separating quasars from stars with the database from the 2MASS and FIRST survey catalogs. Having a train- ing sample of sources of known object types, the classifiers are trained to separate quasars from stars. By the statistical properties of the sample, the features important for classifica- tion are selected. We compare the classification results with and without feature selection. Experiments show that the results with feature selection are better than those without feature selection. From the high accuracy found, it is concluded that these automated methods are robust and effective for classifying point sources. They may all be applied to large survey projects (e.g. selecting input catalogs) and for other astronomical issues, such as the parame- ter measurement of stars and the redshift estimation of galaxies and quasars.     

A Statistical Analysis of Point-like Sources in the Chandra Galactic Center Survey

The Chandra Galactic Center Survey detected ～ 800 X-ray point-like sources in the 2°× 0.8° sky region around the Galactic Center. We study the spatial and luminosity distributions of these sources according to their spectral properties. Fourteen bright sources detected are used to fit jointly an absorbed power-law model, from which the power-law photon index is determined to be ～2.5. Assuming that all other sources have the same power-law form, the relation between hardness ratio and HI column density NH is used to estimate the NH values for all sources. Monte Carlo simulations show that these sources are more likely concentrated in the Galactic center region, rather than distributed throughout the Galactic disk. We also find that the luminosities of the sources are positively correlated with their HI column densities, i.e., a more luminous source has a higher HI column density. From this relation, we suggest that the X-ray luminosity comes from the interaction between an isolated old neutron star and interstellar medium (mainly dense molecular clouds). Using the standard Bondi accretion theory and the statistical information of molecular clouds in the Galactic center, we confirm this positive correlation and calculate the luminosity range in this scenario,which is consistent with the observation (1032 - 1035 erg s-1).     

The Synchrotron-self-Compton Radiation Accompanying Shallow Decaying X-Ray Afterglow： the Case of GRB 940217

High energy emission (> tens MeV) of Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) provides an important clue on the physical processes occurring in GRBs that may be correlated with the GRB early afterglow. A shallow decline phase has been well identified in about half of Swift Gamma-ray Burst X-ray afterglows. The widely considered interpretation involves a significant energy injection and possibly time-evolving shock parameter(s). We calculate the synchrotron-self-Compton (SSC) radiation of such an external forward shock and show that it could explain the well-known long term high energy (i.e., tens MeV to GeV) afterglow of GRB 940217. We propose that cooperation of Swift and GLAST will help to reveal the nature of GRBs.     

Effects of Magnetic Fields on Neutrino-dominated Accretion Model for Gamma-ray Bursts

Many models of gamma-ray bursts suggest a common central engine:a black hole of several solar masses accreting matter from a disk at an accretion rate from 0.01 to 10 M_⊙s~(-1),the inner region of the disk is cooled by neutrino emission and large amounts of its binding energy are liberated,which could trigger the fireball.We improve the neutrino- dominated accreting flows by including the effects of magnetic fields.We find that more than half of the liberated energy can be extracted directly by the large-scale magnetic fields in the disk,and it turns out that the temperature of the disk is a bit lower than the neutrino-dominated accreting flows without magnetic field.Therefore,the outflows are magnetically-dominated rather than neutrino dominated.In our model,the neutrino mechanism can fuel some GRBs (not the brightest ones),but cannot fuel X-ray flares.The magnetic processes(both BZ and electromagnetic luminosity from a disk)are viable mechanisms for most of GRBs and their following X-ray flares.     

Astrometric calibration of the Xuyi Schmidt Telescope Photometric Survey of the Galactic Anti-center （XSTPS-GAC）

We present astrometric calibration of the Xuyi Schmidt Telescope Photometric Survey of the Galactic Anti-center(XSTPS-GAC). XSTPS-GAC is the photometric part of the Digital Sky Survey of the Galactic Anti-center(DSS-GAC),which is a photometric and spectroscopic sky survey, in combination with LAMOST.In order to select an astrometric reference catalog, we made comparisons between the four widely used astrometric catalogs, GSC2.3, USNO-B1.0, UCAC3 and PPMXL.PPMXL shows relatively small systematic errors in positions and more homogeneous proper motion distributions toward the Galactic Anti-center(GAC), and was selected as the reference catalog. Based on the high quality and bright reference stars that were picked out from PPMXL, we performed a 4th-order polynomial fitting in image units,to construct the transformation relation between coordinates used by XSTPS-GAC and standard coordinates, and to simultaneously correct the image distortions in the CCD. Then we applied the derived relation to all sources to obtain their mean celestial coordinates based on the International Celestial Reference System. For bright point sources with r 17.0 mag, the accuracy of astrometric calibration could reach about80 mas for each of the g, r, i bands, with systematic errors being less than 10 mas. But for the faint sources at the brightness limit of the survey, which was r ～ 19.0 mag, the accuracy can still reach 200 mas. After combining all observations, the final weighted average coordinates could reach an accuracy of less than 70 mas for bright stars. For faint stars, the rms residuals of weighted coordinates decrease to ～ 110 mas. The final combined XSTPS-GAC coordinates show a good consistency with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.     

An accelerated direct demodulation method for image reconstruction using spherical data from the hard X-ray modulation telescope

The hard X-ray modulation telescope (HXMT) mission is mainly devoted to performing an all-sky survey at 1 250 keV with both high sensitivity and high spatial resolution. The observed data reduction as well as the image reconstruction for HXMT can be achieved by using the direct demodulation method (DDM). However the original DDM is too computationally expensive for multi-dimensional data with high resolution to be employed for HXMT data. We propose an accelerated direct demodulation method especially adapted for data from HXMT. Simulations are also presented to demonstrate this method.     

VOFilter： Bridging Virtual Observatory and Industrial Office Applications

VOFilter is an XML based filter developed by the Chinese Virtual Observatory project to transform tabular data files from VOTable format into OpenDocument format. VOTable is an XML format defined for the exchange of tabular data in the context of the Virtual Observatory (VO). It is the first Proposed Recommendation defined by International Virtual Observatory Alliance, and has obtained wide support from both the VO community and many Astronomy projects. OpenOffice.org is a mature, open source, and front office application suite with the advantage of native support of industrial standard OpenDocument XML file format. Using the VOFilter, VOTable files can be loaded in OpenOffice.org Calc, a spreadsheet application, and then displayed and analyzed as other spreadsheet files. Here, the VOFilter acts as a connector, bridging the coming VO with current industrial office applications. We introduce Virtual Observatory and technical background of the VOFilter. Its workflow, installation and usage are presented. Existing problems and limitations are also discussed together with the future development plans.     

A Close Correlation between the Spectral Lags and Redshifts of Gamma-Ray Bursts

Based on nine BATSE GRBs with known redshifts, we found that the maximum spectral lag of all the pulses in a gamma-ray burst （GRB） appears to be anti-correlated with the redshift of the burst. In order to confirm this finding, we analyzed 10 GRBs detected by HETE-2 with known redshifts and found a similar relation. Using the relation, we estimated the redshifts of 878 long GRBs in the BATSE catalog, then we investigated the distributions of the redshifts and 869 Eiso of these GRBs. The distribution of the estimated redshifts is concentrated at z = 1.4 and the distribution of Eiso peaks at 10^52.5 erg. The underlying physics of the correlation is unclear at present.     

A Close Correlation between the Spectral Lags and Redshifts of Gamma-Ray Bursts

Based on nine BATSE GRBs with known redshifts, we found that the maximum spectral lag of all the pulses in a gamma-ray burst (GRB) appears to be anti-correlated with the redshift of the burst. In order to confirm this finding, we analyzed 10 GRBs detected by HETE-2 with known redshifts and found a similar relation. Using the relation, we estimated the redshifts of 878 long GRBs in the BATSE catalog, then we investigated the distributions of the redshifts and 869 Eiso of these GRBs. The distribution of the estimated redshifts is concentrated at z = 1.4 and the distribution of Eiso peaks at 1052.5 erg. The underlying physics of the correlation is unclear at present.     

X-ray Lines in Gamma-ray Bursts and Cerenkov Line Mechanism

X-ray emission and absorption features are of great importance in our understanding the nature and environment of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). So far, iron emission lines have been detected in at least four GRB afterglows. In this paper, the observational properties and physical constraints on materials surrounding GRB sources are reviewed, and several classes of theoretical models are also discussed. We will specially concentrate on the Cerenkov line mechanism, in which the broad iron lines are expected, and a small mass of Fe is required to produce the large line luminosity. In addition, our interpretation can favor the recent jet unified model for different classes of gamma-ray bursts with a standard energy reservoir.     

Statistical Properties of the Highest Pulses in Gamma-Ray Bursts

We study the statistical properties of the highest pulses within individual gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). A wavelet package analysis technique and a developed pulse-finding algorithm have been applied to identify the highest pulses from burst profiles observed by BATSE on board CGRO from 1991 April 21 to 1999 January 26. The statistical light curves of the highest pulses in four energy channels have been derived by an aligning method, which illustrate the temporal evolution of the pulse emission. Our result that narrower pulses go with higher energies is consistent with previous findings. By normalizing both the pulse durations and counts to unity, “characteristic” profiles of the highest pulses in the four channels are also derived. The four characteristic profiles are turned out to be almost the same, thus strongly support the previous conclusion that the temporal profiles in different energy channels are self-similar and the previous conjecture on GRB pulses, implying that the emission process is similar at different energies. The cosmological time dilation effect is examined by investigating the relationship between the pulse flux and pulse duration. An anti-correlation between the two was found, which agrees with the expectation of the cosmological time dilation effect. Also, the evolution of the pulse duration with the observational epoch is studied. The result shows that the pulse duration tends to be shorter in later epochs. This trend cannot be explained by the present theoretical models, and may represent a great challenge to current theories.     

Extinction of Beamed Gamma-ray Burst Afterglows in a Dense Circumstellar Cloud

Broadband afterglow observations provide a probe of the density structure of the circumburst medium. In the spreading jet model, prompt and intense X-ray/UV radiation from the reverse shock may destroy and clear the dust in the circumburst cloud out to about 30 pc within the initial solid angle of the jet. Asthe jet expands significantly, optical radiation from the high-latitude part of the jet may suffer extinction by dust outside the initial solid angle, while radiation from the part within the initial solid angle can be observed without extinction. In previous studies, it is usually assumed that the extinction is complete. We calculate the extinction effect by taking the optical depth into account. Our numerical results showthat a break appears in the light curve of optical afterglow but it extends over a factor of ～ 80 in time rather than a factor of ～ 10 in time for the case of strong dust extinction and a factor of ～ 60 in time for the case without dust extinction. These results may provide a way to judge how large the number density of the circumburst cloud is. Finally, we carry out a detailed modeling for the afterglow of GRB 000926. Our model can provide a good fit to the multi-color observations of this event.