SUB-CHANDRASEKHAR MASS MODELS FOR SUPERNOVAE

By Stan Woosley, D. Kasen. 2010

202 citations recorded by the source corpus.

For carbon–oxygen white dwarfs accreting hydrogen or helium at rates in the range ∼(1–10) × 10−8 M☉ yr−1, a variety of explosive outcomes is possible well before the star reaches the Chandrasekhar mass. These outcomes are surveyed for a range of white dwarf masses (0.7–1.1 M☉), accretion rates ((1–7) × 10−8 M☉ yr−1), and initial white dwarf temperatures (0.01 and 1 L☉). The results are particularly sensitive to the convection that goes on during the last few minutes before the explosion. Unless this convection maintains a shallow temperature gradient and unless the density is sufficiently high, the accreted helium does not detonate. Below a critical helium ignition density, which we estimate to be (5–10) × 105 g cm−3, either helium novae or helium deflagrations result. The hydrodynamics, nucleosynthesis, light curves, and spectra of a representative sample of detonating and deflagrating models are explored. Some can be quite faint indeed, powered at peak for a few days by the decay of 48Cr and 48V. Only the hottest, most massive white dwarfs considered with the smallest helium layers, show reasonable agreement with the light curves and spectra of common Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia). For the other models, especially those involving lighter white dwarfs, the helium shell mass exceeds 0.05 M☉ and the mass of the 56Ni that is synthesized exceeds 0.01 M☉. These explosions do not look like ordinary SNe Ia or any other frequently observed transient.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/6ca2fc802d576bc71ae593f91327339f9c108183

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In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. D. Kasen
2. Stan Woosley
3. D. Maoz
4. N. Smith
5. F. Mannucci
6. E. Berger
7. A. Filippenko
8. B. Metzger

Citations in the corpus

• TYPE Iax SUPERNOVAE: A NEW CLASS OF STELLAR EXPLOSION (2012, background): “Woosley & Kasen (2011) explored possible subChandrasekhar-mass explosion models, some of which had a He-layer detonation or deflagration.”
• Sub-Chandrasekhar-mass White Dwarf Detonations Revisited (2017, background): “…n 20 18 2 SHEN ET AL. sten et al. 2007; Shen & Bildsten 2009), coupled with the problems besetting MCh scenarios, motivated a resurgence of double detonation studies focused on the explosion of sub-MCh WDs (Fink et al. 2007, 2010; Kromer et al. 2010; Woosley & Kasen 2011; Shen & Bildsten 2014).”
• THE LONG-TERM EVOLUTION OF DOUBLE WHITE DWARF MERGERS (2011, background): “The double detonation scenario has received more attention recently due to the prediction of He detonations in pre-AM CVn systems (Bildsten et al. 2007; Fink et al. 2007, 2010; Shen & Bildsten 2009; Shen et al. 2010; Sim et al. 2010; Woosley & Kasen 2011).”
• Three-dimensional pure deflagration models with nucleosynthesis and synthetic observables for type ia supernovae (2013, background): “Both violent WD–WD mergers (Pakmor et al. 2013; Ruiter et al. 2013) and sub-Chandrasekhar double detonations (Fink et al. 2010; Kromer et al. 2010; Woosley & Kasen 2011; Moll & Woosley 2013) may account for normal and subluminous types of SNe Ia.”
• CORE-COLLAPSE SUPERNOVAE FROM 9 TO 120 SOLAR MASSES BASED ON NEUTRINO-POWERED EXPLOSIONS (2015, methodology): “For the sub-Chandrasekhar mass model we use model 10HC of Woosley & Kasen (2011).”
• Type-Ia Supernova Rates and the Progenitor Problem: A Review (2011, background): “Questions, however, have been raised as to whether the entire picture does not require too much fine tuning (e.g., Cassisi et al. 1998; Piersanti et al. 2000; Shen & Bildsten 2007; Woosley & Kasen 2011).”
• Dawes Review 6: The Impact of Companions on Stellar Evolution (2016, background): “Such sub-Chandrasehkar detonation models (Woosley & Kasen, 2011) also do not reproduce the light curve.”
• Observational Clues to the Progenitors of Type Ia Supernovae (2013, background): “Questions, however, have been raised as to whether this does not require too much fine tuning (e.g., Piersanti et al. 2000, Shen & Bildsten 2007, Woosley & Kasen 2011), or contradictory assumptions about the spherical symmetry of the accretion flow – on the one hand an asymmetric Roche-lobe…”
• A COMPACT DEGENERATE PRIMARY-STAR PROGENITOR OF SN 2011fe (2011, background): “We thus consider Mp,lim = 0.5M as a conservative lower limit to the mass of the primary; this value is below the lower mass limit (Mp,lim = 0.7) for sub-luminous SN Ia models (Sim et al. 2010; Woosley & Kasen 2011).”
• 3D deflagration simulations leaving bound remnants: a model for 2002cx-like Type Ia supernovae (2012, background): “Normal SNe Ia would then originate from other progenitors like double-degenerate mergers (e.g. Pakmor et al. 2012; Ruiter et al. 2012) or sub-Chandrasekharmass double detonations (e.g. Fink et al. 2010; Kromer et al. 2010; Woosley & Kasen 2011).”
• CALCIUM-RICH GAP TRANSIENTS IN THE REMOTE OUTSKIRTS OF GALAXIES (2011, background): “Woosley & Kasen (2011) derive several models for explosions of sub-Chandrashekhar white dwarfs.”