Repeating and Non-repeating Fast Radio Bursts from Binary Neutron Star Mergers

TL;DR

This paper explores how binary neutron star mergers can produce both repeating and non-repeating fast radio bursts, with environmental factors and remnant properties explaining observed FRB behaviors and rates.

Contribution

It introduces a model linking BNS merger remnants to FRB types, explaining the timing and environment effects on FRB observability and rate evolution.

Findings

Non-repeating FRBs can occur shortly after BNS mergers before ejecta blocks signals.

Repeating FRBs may originate from stable neutron star remnants, appearing 1-10 years post-merger.

Detection rates of repeating FRBs increase with search sensitivity, explaining the rarity of observed repeaters.

Abstract

Most of fast radio bursts (FRB) do not show evidence for repetition, and such non-repeating FRBs may be produced at the time of a merger of binary neutron stars (BNS), provided that the BNS merger rate is close to the high end of the currently possible range. However, the merger environment is polluted by dynamical ejecta, which may prohibit the radio signal to propagate. We examine this by using a general-relativistic simulation of a BNS merger, and show that the ejecta appears about 1 ms after the rotation speed of the merged star becomes the maximum. Therefore there is a time window in which an FRB signal can reach outside, and the short duration of non-repeating FRBs can be explained by screening after ejecta formation. A fraction of BNS mergers may leave a rapidly rotating and stable neutron star, and such objects may be the origin of repeating FRBs like FRB 121102. We show that a merger remnant would appear as a repeating FRB in a time scale of about 1-10 yrs, and expected properties are consistent with the observations of FRB 121102. We construct an FRB rate evolution model including these two populations of repeating and non-repeating FRBs from BNS mergers, and show that the detection rate of repeating FRBs relative to non-repeating ones rapidly increases with improving search sensitivity. This may explain that the only repeating FRB 121102 was discovered by the most sensitive FRB search with Arecibo. Several predictions are made, including appearance of a repeating FRB 1-10 years after a BNS merger that is localized by gravitational wave and subsequent electromagnetic radiation.