The temporally evolving energy and waiting time statistics of two repeating fast radio bursts

Abstract

ABSTRACT Based on two very large samples of repeating fast radio bursts (FRBs), i.e. FRB 20121102A and FRB 20201124A observed by the FAST telescope, we study the statistical properties of energy and waiting time. The bent power-law (BPL) model, thresholded power-law (TPL) model, and Band function are used to fit the distribution of energy, and the BPL model and exponential (EXP) model are used to fit the distribution of waiting time. It is found that no single model can fit the distribution of energy or waiting time well in the full range. To investigate the possible temporal evolution, we divide the full samples into several subsamples according to the observing sessions. We find that the distribution of energy for all subsamples can be well fitted by both BPL model and TPL model, while the distribution of waiting time for all subsamples can be well fitted by both BPL model and EXP model. Importantly, for the distribution of energy, the BPL index β of all the subsamples is almost invariant, but the median value parameter xb varies significantly. Similar situation happens in the distribution of waiting time. Furthermore, for the distribution of waiting time, the occurrence rate parameter λ in EXP model varies significantly. These features show that there may be a common emission mechanism for repeating FRBs, but the burst energy and occurrence rate are temporally evolving.