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We report early optical linear polarization observations of two gamma-ray bursts made with the MASTER robotic telescope network. We found the minimum polar- ization for GRB150301B to be 8% at the beginning of the initial stage, whereas we detected no polarization for GRB150413A either at the rising branch or after the burst reached the power-law afterglow stage. This is the earliest measurement of the polarization (in cosmological rest frame) of gamma-ray bursts. The primary intent of the paper is to discover optical emission and publish extremely rare (unique) high- quality light curves of the prompt optical emission of gamma-ray bursts during the non-monotonic stage of their evolution. We report that our team has discovered the optical counterpart of one of the bursts, GRB150413A., Comment: accepted, MNRAS, 2015

The Swift era has posed a challenge to the standard blast‐wave model of Gamma Ray Burst afterglows. The achromatic steepening of the afterglow lightcurves (‘jet break’) considered in the model as the signature of outflow collimation, has become almost rare. Several afterglows exhibited complex lightcurves that did not confirm by the predicted spectral—temporal ‘closure relations’ of the blastwave model. Here we present optical observations and broadband modelling of the afterglow of GRB0505025A, a bright burst detected and followed up by Swift. We find that the overall evolution of the afterglow can not be explained by a single forward shock emission, though the late time evolution is compatible with the predictions of the standard afterglow model, including a jet break. We explain the afterglow evolution based on a two‐component jet model and estimate the physical parameters.

X-ray flashes (XRFs) are, like gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), thought to signal the collapse of massive stars in distant galaxies. Many models posit that the isotropic equivalent energies of XRFs are lower than those for GRBs, such that they are visible from a reduced range of distances when compared with GRBs. Here we present the results of two-epoch Hubble Space Telescope imaging of two XRFs. These images, taken approximately 45 and 200 days postburst, reveal no evidence of an associated supernova in either case. Supernovae such as SN 1998bw would have been visible out to z ~ 1.5 in each case, while fainter supernovae such as SN 2002ap would have been visible to z ~ 1. If the XRFs lie at such large distances, their energies would not fit the observed correlation between the GRB peak energy and isotropic energy release (Ep ∝ Eimg1.gif), in which soft bursts are less energetic. We conclude that, should these XRFs reside at low redshifts (z < 0.6), either their line of sight is heavily extinguished, they are associated with extremely faint supernovae, or, unlike GRBs, these XRFs do not have temporally coincident supernovae.