Expected Gamma-Ray Burst Detection Rates and Redshift Distributions for the BlackCAT CubeSat Mission

Dokumentdetails

ID

oai:arXiv.org:2405.10872

Thema

Astrophysics - High Energy Astroph... Astrophysics - Instrumentation and...

Autor

Colosimo, Joseph M. Fox, Derek B. Falcone, Abraham D. Palmer, David M. Hancock, Frederic Betts, Michael Bevidas Jr., William A. Buffington, Jacob C. Burrows, David N. Catlin, Zachary E. Emeigh, Timothy Forstmeier, Thomas Nizam, Kadri M. Reichard, Collin Scigliani, Ana C. Stone, Lukas R. Thornton, Ian Wages, Mitchell Washington, Daniel Zugger, Michael E.

Kategorie

Wissenschaften: Astrophysik

Jahr

2024

Auflistungsdatum

22.05.2024

Schlüsselwörter

cubesat astrophysics high-redshift grbs mission blackcat

Metrisch

Zusammenfassung

We report the results of an extensive set of simulations exploring the sensitivity of the BlackCAT CubeSat to long-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs).

BlackCAT is a NASA APRA-funded CubeSat mission for the detection and real-time sub-arcminute localization of high-redshift ($z\gtrsim 3.5$) GRBs.

Thanks to their luminous and long-lived afterglow emissions, GRBs are uniquely valuable probes of high-redshift star-forming galaxies and the intergalactic medium.

In addition, each detected GRB with a known redshift serves to localize a region of high-redshift star formation in three dimensions, enabling deep follow-on searches for host galaxies and associated local and large-scale structure.

We explore two distinct models for the GRB redshift distribution and luminosity function, both consistent with \textit{Swift} observations.

We find that, for either model, BlackCAT is expected to detect a mean of 42 bursts per year on-orbit, with 6.7% to 10% of these at $z>3.5$.

BlackCAT bursts will be localized to $r_{90} \lesssim 55^{\prime\prime}$ precision and reported to the community within seconds.

Due to the mission orbit and pointing scheme, bursts will be located in the night sky and well-placed for deep multiwavelength follow-up observations.

BlackCAT is on schedule to achieve launch readiness in 2025.

;Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, 3 tables; Accepted for publication in ApJ

Colosimo, Joseph M.,Fox, Derek B.,Falcone, Abraham D.,Palmer, David M.,Hancock, Frederic,Betts, Michael,Bevidas Jr., William A.,Buffington, Jacob C.,Burrows, David N.,Catlin, Zachary E.,Emeigh, Timothy,Forstmeier, Thomas,Nizam, Kadri M.,Reichard, Collin,Scigliani, Ana C.,Stone, Lukas R.,Thornton, Ian,Wages, Mitchell,Washington, Daniel,Zugger, Michael E., 2024, Expected Gamma-Ray Burst Detection Rates and Redshift Distributions for the BlackCAT CubeSat Mission