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File:Hubble Pinpoints Optical Counterpart of Gamma Ray Burst in a Distant Galaxy (1997-20-488).jpg

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This is a false-color Hubble Space Telescope image of the visible fireball which accompanied the gamma ray burst called GRB 970228. This is the first optical image ever taken which associates a gamma-ray burst source with a potential host galaxy.

Summary

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Description
English: This is a false-color Hubble Space Telescope image of the visible fireball which accompanied the gamma ray burst called GRB 970228. This is the first optical image ever taken which associates a gamma-ray burst source with a potential host galaxy. This observation provides strong supporting evidence that gamma-ray bursts are cosmological- they originate in distant galaxies across the universe.

The burst was detected on February 28, 1997. The Hubble picture is a combination of two images taken on March 26 and April 7, with the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (in planetary camera mode). The arrow points to the fireball, which is a white blob immediately to the upper left of image center. Immediately to the lower right of center is an extended object (roughly resembling an "E") interpreted to be the host galaxy where the gamma-ray burst is embedded. A follow-up image taken on April 7 showed the fireball had faded, but not the extended source, supporting the interpretation it is a host galaxy at great distance.

It may be a significant finding that the fireball is offset from the center of the galaxy. This rules out a supermassive black hole that could be at the galaxy's core, as the source of the gamma-ray burst. A more likely explanation is that the burst came from the titanic collision of two neutron stars, or a neutron star with a stellar-mass black hole, in the disk of the galaxy.
Date 10 June 1997 (upload date)
Source Hubble Pinpoints Optical Counterpart of Gamma Ray Burst in a Distant Galaxy
Author K. Sahu, M. Livio, L. Petro, D. Macchetto, STScI and NASA
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Keyword
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Gamma Ray Bursts

Licensing

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Public domain This file is in the public domain because it was created by NASA and ESA. NASA Hubble material (and ESA Hubble material prior to 2009) is copyright-free and may be freely used as in the public domain without fee, on the condition that only NASA, STScI, and/or ESA is credited as the source of the material. This license does not apply if ESA material created after 2008 or source material from other organizations is in use.
The material was created for NASA by Space Telescope Science Institute under Contract NAS5-26555, or for ESA by the Hubble European Space Agency Information Centre. Copyright statement at hubblesite.org or 2008 copyright statement at spacetelescope.org. For material created by the European Space Agency on the spacetelescope.org site since 2009, use the {{ESA-Hubble}} tag.

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