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Gamma-ray Bursts

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) pose one of the greatest mysteries of modern astronomy. About once a day, the sky lights up with a spectacular flash, or burst, of gamma-rays. More often than not, this burst out shines all of the other sources of cosmic gamma-rays added together. The source of the burst then disappears altogether. No one can predict when the next burst will occur or from what direction in the sky it will come. At present, we don't exactly know what causes these flashes, and we've only recently determined how far away they are!

* What we know about gamma-ray bursts
    * How they look as functions of time and energy
    * How they are distributed in the sky
* Searching for gamma-ray burst counterparts
* Models of gamma-ray bursts
* Movie of gamma-ray burst locations

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Last Updated: Friday, 22-Aug-2008 11:34:01 EDT