The First Short GRB Millimeter Afterglow: The Wide-angled Jet of the Extremely Energetic SGRB 211106A

Abstract

Abstract We present the discovery of the first millimeter afterglow of a short-duration γ -ray burst (SGRB) and the first confirmed afterglow of an SGRB localized by the GUANO system on Swift. Our Atacama Large Millimeter/Sub-millimeter Array (ALMA) detection of SGRB 211106A establishes an origin in a faint host galaxy detected in Hubble Space Telescope imaging at 0.7 ≲ z ≲ 1.4. From the lack of a detectable optical afterglow, coupled with the bright millimeter counterpart, we infer a high extinction, A V ≳ 2.6 mag along the line of sight, making this one of the most highly dust-extincted SGRBs known to date. The millimeter-band light curve captures the passage of the synchrotron peak from the afterglow forward shock and reveals a jet break at <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>t</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>jet</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>29.2</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>4.0</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:mn>4.5</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> </mml:math> days. For a presumed redshift of z = 1, we infer an opening angle, θ jet = (15.°5 ± 1.°4), and beaming-corrected kinetic energy of <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:mi>log</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">(</mml:mo> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>E</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">K</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo stretchy="true">/</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mi>erg</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">)</mml:mo> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mn>51.8</mml:mn> <mml:mo>±</mml:mo> <mml:mn>0.3</mml:mn> </mml:math> , making this one of the widest and most energetic SGRB jets known to date. Combining all published millimeter-band upper limits in conjunction with the energetics for a large sample of SGRBs, we find that energetic outflows in high-density environments are more likely to have detectable millimeter counterparts. Concerted afterglow searches with ALMA should yield detection fractions of 24%–40% on timescales of ≳2 days at rates of ≈0.8–1.6 per year, outpacing the historical discovery rate of SGRB centimeter-band afterglows.