A Merger Origin for Short Gamma-Ray Bursts Inferred from the Afterglow and Host Galaxy of GRB 050724

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  • 4 August 2005
Abstract
Despite a rich phenomenology, gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are divided into two classes based on their duration and spectral hardness -- the long-soft and the short-hard bursts. The discovery of afterglow emission from long GRBs was a watershed event, pinpointing their origin to star forming galaxies, and hence the death of massive stars, and indicating an energy release of about 10^51 erg. While theoretical arguments suggest that short GRBs are produced in the merger of compact object binaries (neutron stars or black holes), the progenitors, energetics, and environments of these events remain elusive despite recent localizations. Here we report the discovery of radio, optical, and infrared afterglow emission from the short-hard GRB 050724, which unambiguously associate it with an elliptical galaxy at a redshift, z=0.257. We show that the energy release is 1-3 orders of magnitude smaller than that of long GRBs, and that the burst ejecta may be collimated in jets. More importantly, the nature of the host galaxy for the first time indicates that short GRBs arise from an old (>1 Gyr) stellar population, thereby providing direct support for coalescing compact object binaries as the progenitors.

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