Konstantin Postnov — Page 3

arXiv2004

Stellar explosions: from supernovae to gamma-ray bursts

Current understanding of core collapse and thermonuclear supernovae is reviewed. Recent progress in unveiling the nature of cosmic gamma-ray bursts (GRB) is discussed, with the focus on the apparent link of several GRBs with an energetic subclass of stellar explosions, type Ib/c core-collapse supernovae. This relation provides the strong case that the GRB phenomenon is connected with the final stages of massive star evolution and possibly with the formation of neutron stars and black holes.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2003

Stellar black hole mass function: determination and possible implications for fundamental gravity

We discuss masses of stellar black holes found in binary systems and errors in their determination. The observed mass distribution has a broad shape within the range $4-16 M_\odot$ without visible concentration to some preferred value. On the other hand, the black hole mass funciton as inferred from observations of luminous X-ray sources in other galaxies exhibits a power-law form. We show that both dynamically obtained black hole mass function and derived from X-ray observations can be made consistent in the frame of the hypothesis of enhanced black hole evaporation on a RSII brane for reasonable values of the warp-factor of the Anti-de-Sitter bulk space.

astro-ph↗