Early Optical Follow-up Observations of Gamma Ray Bursts with the Robotic Liverpool Telescope

Robotic telescopes are new tools in Astronomy to study astronomical objects, which vary in their brightness and spectral properties on timescales from seconds to years, and therefore contribute essentially to areas of astronomy, which were not sufficiently covered by conventional tele-scopes. One of the crucial advantages of robotic telescopes is the rapid reaction to Targets of Opportunity, including short and unpredictable phenomena, such as Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs). These flashes (lasting at most a few min-utes) of high energy photons occur approximately once per day in random directions in the sky. Subsequently, at their positions, longer lasting afterglows are detected in X-rays, optical and radio wavelenghts. Study of early afterglow emission is crucial since it holds important information a