A Comprehensive Analysis of Swift/XRT Data: IV. Single Power-Law Decaying Lightcurves vs. Canonical Lightcurves and Implications for a Unified Origin of X-rays

TL;DR

This study compares single power-law decaying X-ray lightcurves with canonical ones in GRBs, suggesting a unified external shock origin and supporting a prior X-ray emission model with implications for jet structure.

Contribution

It demonstrates that SPL and canonical X-ray lightcurves can be explained within a unified external shock framework, highlighting the role of energy injection and prior emission models.

Findings

SPL lightcurves are similar in prompt gamma-ray properties to canonical ones.

X-ray afterglows satisfy external shock closure relations.

T0 distribution supports prior X-ray emission prior to GRB trigger.

Abstract

By analyzing the Swift/XRT lightcurves detected before 2009 July, we find 19 cases that monotonously decay as a single power law (SPL) with an index of 1 ~ 1.7 from tens (or hundreds) to ~ 10^5 seconds post the GRB trigger, apparently different from the canonical lightcurves characterized by a shallow-to-normal decay transition. No statistical difference is found in their prompt gamma-rays, and the X-ray properties of the two samples are also similar, although the SPL sample tend to have a slightly lower NH value of the host galaxies and larger energy release compared with the canonical sample. The SPL XRT lightcurves in the burst frame gradually merge into a conflux.The normal decay segment for the canonical sample has the same feature. Similar to the normal decay segment, the SPL lightcurves satisfy the closure relations of external shock models. If the X-rays are the afterglow of the GRB fireball, our results indicate that the shallow decay would be due to energy injection and the total energy budget after injection for both samples of GRBs is comparable. More intriguing, we find that a prior X-ray emission model proposed by Yamazaki is more straightforward to interpret the data. We show that the zero times (T0) of the X-rays atisfy a log-normal distribution, and the negligible T0's of the SPL sample are consistent with being the tail of T0 distributions at low end. Referenced to T0, the canonical XRT lightcurves well trace the SPL lightcurves. The T0's of the canonical lightcurves in our analysis are usually much larger than the offsets of the known precursors from the main GRBs, indicating the X-rays would be an emission component from external shocks prior to GRB trigger. The lack of detection of a jet-like break in most XRT lightcurves implies that the opening angle of its jet would be usually large.