Broadband lightcurve characteristics of GRBs 980425 and 060218 and comparison with long-lag, wide-pulse GRBs

TL;DR

This study systematically analyzes the lightcurve properties of two low-luminosity GRBs across energy bands, revealing energy-dependent pulse characteristics and spectral lags that suggest similar radiation physics to long-lag, wide-pulse GRBs.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed comparison of lightcurve features between LL-GRBs and long-lag, wide-pulse GRBs, highlighting their shared physical mechanisms.

Findings

Pulse width and symmetry vary with energy in both GRBs.

X-ray and gamma-ray emissions follow similar energy-dependent relations.

Spectral lags are consistent with those in long-lag, wide-pulse GRBs.

Abstract

It has been recently argued that low-luminosity gamma-ray bursts (LL-GRBs) are likely a unique GRB population. Here, we present systematic analysis of the lightcurve characteristics from X-ray to gamma-ray energy bands for the two prototypical LL-GRBs 980425 and 060218. It is found that both the pulse width ($w$) and the ratio of the rising width to the decaying width ($r/d$) of theses two bursts are energy-dependent over a broad energy band. There exists a significant trend that the pulses tend to be narrower and more symmetry with respect to the higher energy bands for the two events. Both the X-rays and the gamma-rays follow the same $w - E$ and $r/d - E$ relations. These facts may indicate that the X-ray emission tracks the gamma-ray emission and both are likely to be originated from the same physical mechanism. Their light curves show significant spectral lags. We calculate the three types of lags with the pulse peaking time ($t_{peak}$), the pulse centroid time ($t_{cen}$), and the cross-correlation function (CCF). The derived $t_{peak}$ and $t_{cen}$ are a power-law function of energy. The lag calculated by CCF is strongly correlated with that derived from $t_{peak}$. But the lag derived from $t_{cen}$ is less correlated with that derived from $t_{peak}$ and CCF. The energy dependence of the lags is shallower at higher energy bands. These characteristics are well consistent with that observed in typical long-lag, wide-pulse GRBs, suggesting that GRBs 980425 and 060218 may share the similar radiation physics with them.