Discovery of a New Soft Gamma Repeater, SGR J1833–0832

Abstract

On 2010 March 19, the Swift/Burst Alert Telescope triggered on a short burst with temporal and spectral characteristics similar to those of soft gamma repeater (SGR) bursts. The source location, however, did not coincide with any known SGR. Subsequent observations of the source error box with the Swift/X-Ray Telescope and the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer led to the discovery of a new X-ray source with a spin period of 7.56 s, confirming SGR J1833–0832 as a new magnetar. Based on our detailed temporal and spectral analyses, we show that the new SGR is rapidly spinning down (4 × 10^(–12) s s^(–1)) and find an inferred dipole magnetic field of 1.8 × 10^(14) G. We also show that the X-ray flux of SGR J1833–0832 remained constant for approximately 20 days following the burst and then started to decline. We derived an accurate location of the source with the Chandra X-ray Observatory and we searched for a counterpart in deep optical and infrared observations of SGR J1833–0832, and for radio pulsed emission with the Westerbork Radio Synthesis Telescope. Finally, we compare the spectral and temporal properties of the source to other magnetar candidates.