The birth place of gamma-ray bursts: abundance gradients and constraints on progenitors

The physics of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and their offsets from the centers of their host galaxies are used to investigate the evolutionary state of their progenitors, motivated by the popular idea that GRBs are linked with the cataclysmic collapse of massive stars. We suggest that GRB progenitors in the inner and outer regions of hosts may be intrinsically different: outer bursts appear to have systematically greater isotropic equivalent energies (or narrower jets). This may provide an interesting clue to the nature of GRBs, and could reflect a relation between metallicity and the evolution of GRB progenitors. If true, then this offset–isotropic luminosity correlation is a strong argument for a collapsar origin of long-duration GRBs. Subject headings: gamma rays: bursts — stars: supernovae—cosmology:observations