Size distribution of cosmic gamma-ray bursts

Abstract

WE report on the combined results of three balloon-borne searches for small cosmic γ-ray bursts, carried out by the Imperial College Space Physics Groups. We suggest that our results are incompatible with the extragalactic source postulated for the large events previously seen by satellites. No decisive directional information has been obtained from the timing measurements, carried out by the Vela satellites on the large (10–100 photon cm−2s−1 (> 100 keV)) events, although a weak correlation with the local spiral arm exists1.