Gamma Ray Bursts are Nascent Black Holes

tjgoodwin writes "A paper (PDF format) published in Nature shows, for the first time, that Gamma Ray Bursts are the result of a massive (> 10 solar masses) star collapsing to form a black hole. PPARC has a press release which includes a notable picture of a T. Rex glancing nervously over its shoulder at a supernova!"

Comments

Gravastars?

[pubudu]

I saw a special on PBS a while back that came to basically the same conclusion, that only a hypernova could produce enough energy for us to notice them at that distance. Is this paper simply more experimental verification?

Of course, my real question is whether the purported alternative to black holes, viz. gravastars (Gravitational Condensate Stars; described here, with an associated /. story here), would do the same thing. It's my understanding that a gravastar would appear (almost?) identical to a black hole from the outside, and so ought to be able to produce this kind of phenomenon, but is it so? Would a star collapsing into a gravastar produce a gamma-ray burst? (I assume that, since they are different from black holes, the details of their formation would be different, as well--perhaps different enough to upset the whole thing.)