Detection of a radio counterpart to the 27 December 2004 giant flare from SGR 1806–20

P. B. Cameron (), P. Chandra, A. Ray, S. R. Kulkarni, D. A. Frail, M. H. Wieringa, E. Nakar, E. S. Phinney, Atsushi Miyazaki, Masato Tsuboi, Sachiko Okumura, N. Kawai, K. M. Menten and F. Bertoldi
Additional contact information
P. B. Cameron: California Institute of Technology
P. Chandra: Tata Institute of Fundamental Research
A. Ray: Tata Institute of Fundamental Research
S. R. Kulkarni: California Institute of Technology
D. A. Frail: National Radio Astronomy Observatory
M. H. Wieringa: Australia Telescope National Facility, CSIRO
E. Nakar: California Institute of Technology
E. S. Phinney: California Institute of Technology
Atsushi Miyazaki: Shanghai Astronomical Observatory
Masato Tsuboi: National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
Sachiko Okumura: National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
N. Kawai: Tokyo Institute of Technology
K. M. Menten: Max Planck Institut für Radioastronomie
F. Bertoldi: University of Bonn

Nature, 2005, vol. 434, issue 7037, 1112-1115

Abstract: Flares back in fashion On 27 December last year, SGR1806–20, a soft γ-ray repeater in Sagittarius, released a giant flare that has been called the brightest explosion ever recorded. SGRs are X-ray stars that sporadically emit low-energy γ-ray bursts. They are thought to be magnetars: neutron stars with observable emissions powered by magnetic dissipation. Five papers in this issue report initial and follow-up observations of this event. The data are remarkable: for instance in a fifth of a second, the flare released as much energy as the Sun radiates in a quarter of a million years. Such power can be explained by catastrophic global crust failure and magnetic reconnection on a magnetar. Releasing a hundred times the energy of the only two previous SGR giant flares, this may have been a once-in-a-lifetime event for astronomers, and for the star itself.

Date: 2005
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DOI: 10.1038/nature03605

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