The hardness-duration correlation in the two classes of gamma-ray bursts

Abstract

The well-known hardness-duration correlation of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) is investigated using data from the 4B catalog. We find that, while the hardness ratio and the duration are obviously correlated for the entire set of the 4B catalog, they are not at all correlated for the two subsets divided at the duration of 2 seconds. However, for other subsets with comparable sizes, the two quantities are significantly correlated. The following conclusions are thus reached: (1) the existence of two classes of GRBs is confirmed; (2) the hardness ratio and the duration are not at all correlated for any of the two classes; (3) different classes of GRBs have different distributions of the hardness ratio and the duration, and it is this difference that causes the correlation between the two quantities for the entire set of bursts.