Electromagnetic emission from long-lived binary neutron star merger remnants II: lightcurves and spectra

Understand

Recent observations indicate that in a large fraction of binary neutron star (BNS) mergers a long-lived neutron star (NS) may be formed rather than a black hole.

• Unambiguous electromagnetic (EM) signatures of such a scenario would strongly impact our knowledge on how short gamma-ray bursts (SGRBs) and their afterglow radiation are generated.
• Furthermore, such EM signals would have profound implications for multimessenger astronomy with joint EM and gravitational-wave (GW) observations of BNS mergers, which will soon become reality with the ground-based advanced LIGO/Virgo GW detector network starting its first science run this year.
• Here we explore such EM signatures based on the model presented in a companion paper, which provides a self-consistent evolution of the post-merger system and its EM emission starting from an early baryonic wind phase and resulting in a final pulsar wind nebula that is confined by the previously ejected material.