* Astronomy

Researchers have made a photometric study of the optical counterpart of the long-duration Gamma Ray Burst (GRB) 030725, which was observed by the HETE FREGATE and WXM instruments on July 25th, 2003, and lasted more than 160s.
An optical counterpart was identified at the Bronberg Observatory in South Africa about 7 hours after the burst occurred.
The optical afterglow was observed between 4 and 15 days after the burst with the 1.54m Danish telescope at La Silla in the V, Rc, and Ic bands.
Observations of the field 8 months after the burst with the EMMI instrument on the La Silla NTT telescope resulted in an upper limit of Rc=24.7mag for the host galaxy of GRB 030725.
The optical afterglow of GRB 030725 was discovered at a private, non-professional observatory and the researchers point out that with the current suite of gamma ray satellites, an effort to organize future contributions of amateur observers may provide substantial help in GRB light curve follow up efforts.


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