Swift J1112.2−8238: a candidate relativistic tidal disruption flare

By G. C. Brown, A. Levan, E. Stanway, N. Tanvir, S. Cenko, E. Berger, Ryan Chornock, A. Cucchiaria. 2015

139 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We present observations of Swift J1112.2−8238, and identify it as a candidate relativistic tidal disruption flare. The outburst was first detected by Swift/Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) in 2011 June as an unknown, long-lived (order of days) gamma-ray transient source. We show that its position is consistent with the nucleus of a faint galaxy for which we establish a likely redshift of z = 0.89 based on a single emission line that we interpret as the blended [O II] λ3727 doublet. At this redshift, the peak X-ray/gamma-ray luminosity exceeded 1047 erg s−1, while a spatially coincident optical transient source had I ∼ 22 (Mg ∼ −21.4 at z = 0.89) during early observations, ∼20 d after the Swift trigger. These properties place Swift J1112.2−8238 in a very similar region of parameter space to the two previously identified members of this class, Swift J1644+57 and Swift J2058+0516. As with those events the high-energy emission shows evidence for variability over the first few days, while late time observations, almost 3 yr post outburst, demonstrate that it has now switched off. Swift J1112.2−8238 brings the total number of such events observed by Swift to three, interestingly all detected by Swift over a ∼3 month period (<3 per cent of its total lifetime as of 2015 March). While this suggests the possibility that further examples may be uncovered by detailed searches of the BAT archives, the lack of any prime candidates in the years since 2011 means these events are undoubtedly rare.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Nuclear and High Energy Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2ed81c1aa363e3470b8fb8215803fb8b011c8b3d

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Astronomy and Astrophysics

In Nuclear and High Energy Physics

Citations in the corpus

A Unified Model for Tidal Disruption Events (2018, background): “Second, only three TDEs have been observed to produce transient relativistic jets (e.g., Bloom et al. 2011; Burrows et al. 2011; Levan et al. 2011; Cenko et al. 2012; Brown et al. 2015).”
New Physical Insights about Tidal Disruption Events from a Comprehensive Observational Inventory at X-Ray Wavelengths (2016, methodology): “One can see that ASASSN-14li, Swift J1644+57, and Swift J2058+05, IGR J17361-4441, SDSS J1201, and SDSS J1323 have a peak luminosity that is either above or comparable with the detection limit associated with the Swift BAT, indicating that only the most extreme events are going to be detected throug”