GRB 090618: different pulse temporal and spectral characteristics within a burst

Abstract

GRB 090618 was simultaneously detected by Swift-BAT and Fermi-GBM. Its light curve shows two emission episodes consisting of four prominent pulses. The pulse in the first episode (episode A) has a smoother morphology than the three pulses in the second episode (episode B). Using the pulse peak-fit method, we have performed a detailed analysis of the temporal and spectral characteristics of these four pulses and found out that the first pulse (pulse A) exhibits distinctly different properties than the others in episode B (pulses B1, B2 and B3) in the following aspects. (i) Both the pulse width ($w$) and the rise-to-decay ratio of pulse ($r/d$, pulse asymmetry) in GRB 090618 are found to be energy-dependent. The indices of the power-law correlation between $w$ and $E$ for the pulses in episode B however are larger than that in episode A. Moreover the pulses B1, B2 and B3 tend to be more symmetric at the higher energy bands while the pulse A displays a reverse trend. (ii) Pulse A shows a hard-to-soft spectral evolution pattern, while the three pulses in the episode B follow the light curve trend. (iii) Pulse A has a longer lag than the pulses B1, B2 and B3. The mechanism which causes the different pulse characteristics within one single GRB is unclear.