The Swift short gamma-ray burst rate density: implications for binary neutron star merger rates

Details The Swift short gamma-ray burst rate density: implications for binary neutron star merger rates The Swift short gamma-ray burst rate density: implications for binary neutron star merger rates

2012-02-10

arxiv.org/abs/1202.2179v1

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

Cosmology and Extragalactic Astrophysics

6 pages, 1 figure, submitted to MNRAS

Scientific paper

Short gamma-ray bursts (SGRBs) observed by {\it Swift} are potentially revealing the first insight into cataclysmic compact object mergers. To ultimately acquire a fundamental understanding of these events requires pan-spectral observations and knowledge of their spatial distribution to differentiate between proposed progenitor populations. Presently (late 2011) there are only some 30% of SGRBs with reasonably firm redshifts, and this sample is highly biased by the limited sensitivity of {\it Swift} to detect SGRBs. We account for the dominant biases to calculate a realistic SGRB rate density out to $z\approx0.5$ using the {\it Swift} sample of peak fluxes, redshifts, and those SGRBs with a beaming angle constraint from X-ray/optical observations. We find an SGRB lower rate density of $7.1^{+4.9}_{-3.2} $ $\mathrm{Gpc}^{-3}\mathrm{yr}^{-1}$ (assuming isotropic emission), and a beaming corrected upper limit of $1200^{+840}_{-550}$ $\mathrm{Gpc}^{-3}\mathrm{yr}^{-1}$. Assuming a significant fraction of binary neutron star mergers produce SGRBs, we calculate lower and upper detection rate limits of $(1-200)$ yr$^{-1}$ by an ALIGO and Virgo coincidence search. Our detection rate is similar to the lower and realistic rates inferred from extrapolations using Galactic pulsar observations and population synthesis.

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