Physics & Astronomy Colloquium – Fall 2021 – Michela Negro

Speaker: Michela Negro (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/UMBC)

Title: High Energy Transient Repeaters: The Case of Gamma-ray Bursts From Magnetar

Abstract: Started in the ’60s with the detection of the first cosmological gamma-ray burst by the Vela satellites the astrophysics of high-energy transients has fascinated the community for more than half a century. Gamma-ray burst (GRB) studies have developed greatly in the last decade thanks to the multi-messenger approach enabled by the gravitational waves interferometers. A particular class of high-energy transients is that of magnetars bursts. Magnetars are highly magnetized, young neutron stars that display a wide range of radiative activity such as bursts, outbursts and giant flares. The latter, in particular, detectable within a few tens of mega-parsec, could be the first known source of repeating extragalactic GRBs. The very recent observations of a magnetar giant flare from the Sculptor galaxy and a Galactic magnetar flare in coincidence to a fast radio burst, have deepened the interest in these objects.

In this talk I will present the current status, the recent developments and future perspectives about the study of magnetars in the field of time-domain high-energy astrophysics.

Homepage: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Michela-Negro/