Two-component jet model for multiwavelength afterglow emission of the extremely energetic burst GRB 221009A

Abstract

ABSTRACT Recently gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) have been detected at very-high-energy (VHE) gamma-rays by imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes, and a two-component jet model has often been invoked to explain multiwavelength data. In this work, multiwavelength afterglow emission from an extremely bright GRB, GRB 221009A, is examined. The isotropic-equivalent gamma-ray energy of this event is among the largest, which suggests that similarly to previous VHE GRBs, the jet opening angle is so small that the collimation-corrected gamma-ray energy is nominal. Afterglow emission from such a narrow jet decays too rapidly, especially if the jet propagates into uniform circumburst material. In the two-component jet model, another wide jet component with a smaller Lorentz factor dominates late-time afterglow emission, and we show that multiwavelength data of GRB 221009A can be explained by narrow and wide jets with opening angles similar to those employed for other VHE GRBs. We also discuss how model degeneracies can be disentangled with observations.