Quantum-spacetime scenarios and soft spectral lags of the remarkable GRB130427A

Understand

We process the Fermi LAT data on GRB130427A using the Fermi Science Tools, and we summarize some of the key facts that render this observation truly remarkable, especially concerning the quality of information on high-energy emission by GRBs.

• We then exploit this richness for a search of spectral lags, of the type that has been recently of interest for its relevance in quantum-spacetime research.
• We do find some evidence of systematic soft spectral lags: when confining the analysis to photons of energies greater than 5 GeV there is an early hard development of minibursts within this long burst.
• The effect turns out to be well characterized quantitatively by a linear dependence, within such a miniburst, of the detection time on energy.