Relationship between the gamma-ray burst pulse width and energy due to the Doppler effect of fireballs

Abstract

We study in details how the pulse width of gamma-ray bursts is related with energy under the assumption that the sources concerned are in the stage of fireballs. Due to the Doppler effect of fireballs, there exists a power law relationship between the two quantities within a limited range of frequency. The power law range and the power law index depend strongly on the observed peak energy \(E_p\) as well as the rest frame radiation form, and the upper and lower limits of the power law range can be determined by \(E_p\). It is found that, within the same power law range, the ratio of the \(FWHM\) of the rising portion to that of the decaying phase of the pulses is also related with energy in the form of power laws. A platform-power-law-platform feature could be observed in the two relationships. In the case of an obvious softening of the rest frame spectrum, the two power law relationships also exist, but the feature would evolve to a peaked one. Predictions on the relationships in the energy range covering both the BATSE and Swift bands for a typical hard burst and a typical soft one are made. A sample of FRED (fast rise and exponential decay) pulse bursts shows that 27 out of the 28 sources belong to either the platform-power-law-platform feature class or the peaked feature group, suggesting that the effect concerned is indeed important for most of the sources of the sample. Among these bursts, many might undergo an obvious softening evolution of the rest frame spectrum.