Raymond and Beverly Sackler School of Physics & Astronomy, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel.
Nature. 2011 Sep 28;478(7367):82-4. doi: 10.1038/nature10365.
Mergers of neutron-star/neutron-star binaries are strong sources of gravitational waves. They can also launch subrelativistic and mildly relativistic outflows and are often assumed to be the sources of short γ-ray bursts. An electromagnetic signature that persisted for weeks to months after the event would strengthen any future claim of a detection of gravitational waves. Here we present results of calculations showing that the interaction of mildly relativistic outflows with the surrounding medium produces radio flares with peak emission at 1.4 gigahertz that persist at detectable (submillijansky) levels for weeks, out to a redshift of 0.1. Slower subrelativistic outflows produce flares detectable for years at 150 megahertz, as well as at 1.4 gigahertz, from slightly shorter distances. The radio transient RT 19870422 (ref. 11) has the properties predicted by our model, and its most probable origin is the merger of a compact neutron-star/neutron-star binary. The lack of radio detections usually associated with short γ-ray bursts does not constrain the radio transients that we discuss here (from mildly relativistic and subrelativistic outflows) because short γ-ray burst redshifts are typically >0.1 and the appropriate timescales (longer than weeks) have not been sampled.
中子星/中子星双星合并是引力波的强源。它们还可以发射亚相对论和轻度相对论喷流，通常被认为是短伽马射线暴的来源。在事件发生后数周到数月持续存在的电磁特征将增强对任何未来引力波探测的断言。在这里，我们呈现的计算结果表明，轻度相对论喷流与周围介质的相互作用会产生在 1.4 千兆赫处具有峰值发射的无线电耀斑，其在可检测（亚毫央斯基）水平上持续数周，直到红移为 0.1。较慢的亚相对论喷流在 150 兆赫和 1.4 千兆赫处产生可检测到的耀斑，从稍微短一些的距离上可以探测到数年。无线电暂态 RT 19870422（参考文献 11）具有我们模型预测的性质，其最可能的起源是紧凑的中子星/中子星双星合并。通常与短伽马射线暴相关的无线电探测缺失并不限制我们在这里讨论的无线电暂态（来自轻度相对论和亚相对论喷流），因为短伽马射线暴的红移通常>0.1，并且没有采样到适当的时间尺度（超过数周）。
