Review of Gamma-Ray Bursts

In the following pages I describe the study of gamma-ray bursts. The original text is taken from a review paper I wrote, although I intend to tinker and add to the text in the future.

The following is an outline of the text. You can start with the introduction, and follow the text sequentially, or you can jump directly to any topic.

• Introduction
• What Are Gamma-Ray Bursts: An overview of the phenomenon.
• The Mystery of Burst Origin: A description of the pre-1997 evidence about the origin of bursts.
• The Solution? A description of the new data since 1997 which has convinced most of the field that bursts are cosmological.
• The Theory of Gamma-Ray Bursts: A presentation of the current theories.
• The Minimal Model: A description of the simplest "minimal" model for the location of bursts.
• Complications with the Minimal Model: Why the minimal model has been abandoned.
• Burst Phenomenology:
  • Spectra:
  • Spectral Evolution:
  • Spectral Lines: The story of the search for spectral lines.
• A Last Word

I thank my colleagues on the BATSE team and at UC San Diego for their assistance over the past 7 years. My research on gamma-ray bursts is supported by the CGRO Guest Investigator Program and by NASA contract NAS8-36081.