Evidence for Primordial Black Hole Final Evaporation: Swift, BATSE and KONUS and Comparisons of VSGRBs and Observations of VSB That Have PBH Time Signatures

TL;DR

This paper presents evidence suggesting that certain very short gamma-ray bursts (VSGRBs and VSBs) may be signatures of primordial black hole evaporation, supported by data from Swift, BATSE, and KONUS, indicating possible galactic PBH presence.

Contribution

It provides the first combined analysis of multiple gamma-ray observatories showing potential PBH evaporation signatures in VSGRBs and VSBs, with estimated statistical significance.

Findings

VSGRBs show galactic asymmetry and hard spectra.

Enhanced VSGRB detection consistent across multiple instruments.

Several VSB events exhibit time structures matching PBH evaporation models.

Abstract

More than a decade ago we identified a class of VSGRB (T90 < 100 ms) as having unusual properties: (1) galactic position asymmetry, (2) very hard gamma spectrum, (3) possible evidence for galactic origin of these events. We now study the recent Swift data and show that a VSGRB enhancement consistent BATSE and KONUS exists. We estimate that this is now a total 4.5sigma observation. We then study the VSB for evidence of the time structure expected for PBH evaporation. Several of the events show the general time structure expected for PBH evaporation. If correct, then PBH must exist in this galaxy. Since even large detectors like BATSE record only a few VSB per year the density of PBH can still be very small and it is hard to predict a rate for the Fermi spacecraft LAT.