Origin of TeV Emission in GRB 221009A: Co-effort of the External Reverse and Forward Shocks

TL;DR

This paper models the TeV emission of GRB 221009A, revealing that early TeV photons mainly originate from the combined effects of external reverse and forward shocks, a novel insight into GRB emission mechanisms.

Contribution

It introduces a model that accounts for the long bursting behavior of GRB 221009A, demonstrating the combined role of reverse and forward shocks in early TeV emission, which is a new perspective.

Findings

Early TeV emission is mainly from external reverse and forward shocks.

Long-lasting energy injection influences the shock emissions.

Later TeV emission is dominated by synchrotron self-Compton in the forward shock.

Abstract

The TeV emission detected in just five gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) is generally ascribed to the synchrotron emission or the synchrotron self-Compton process in the external forward shock. The brightest gamma-ray burst, GRB 221009A, with an unprecedented detected high energy flux of TeV emission, poses a serious challenge to the above scenario. Different from previous works, we involve the long bursting behavior of GRB~221009A in modeling its external-shocks. The TeV emission together with the later multi-band afterglows of GRB 221009A are all successfully reproduced. It is firstly found that the TeV emission in the early phase is mainly from the co-effort of the external reverse and forward shocks, i.e., the inverse-Compton scattering of the synchrotron emission from the external reverse-shock by the electrons in the external forward-shock. This is owing to that the long bursting behavior leads to a long lasting of energy injection into the external shock and the corresponding reverse-shock. In the later phase, the TeV emission is dominated by the synchrotron self-Compton process in the external forward-shock, which is consistent with previous scenario. Our results indicate the vital role of the external reverse-shock in shaping the early TeV emission of GRBs.