DUST PRODUCTION AND PARTICLE ACCELERATION IN SUPERNOVA 1987A REVEALED WITH ALMA
- Department of Astronomy, University of Virginia, PO Box 400325, Charlottesville, VA 22904 (United States)
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT (United Kingdom)
- NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, 8800 Greenbelt Road, Greenbelt, MD 20771 (United States)
- International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR), University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA 6009 (Australia)
- Sterrenkundig Observatorium, Universiteit Gent, Krijgslaan 281 S9, B-9000 Gent (Belgium)
- CEA-Saclay, F-91191 Gif-sur-Yvette (France)
- Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 (United States)
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803 (United States)
- Department of Astronomy and the Oskar Klein Centre, Stockholm University, AlbaNova, SE-106 91 Stockholm (Sweden)
- Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for All-sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO) (Australia)
- Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden St., Cambridge, MA 02138 (United States)
- Lennard-Jones Laboratories, Keele University, ST5 5BG (United Kingdom)
- Space Telescope Science Institute, 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218 (United States)
- Department of Earth and Space Sciences, Chalmers University of Technology, Onsala Space Observatory, SE-43992 Onsala (Sweden)
- Universidad de Valencia, C/Dr. Moliner 50, E-46100 Burjassot (Spain)
Supernova (SN) explosions are crucial engines driving the evolution of galaxies by shock heating gas, increasing the metallicity, creating dust, and accelerating energetic particles. In 2012 we used the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array to observe SN 1987A, one of the best-observed supernovae since the invention of the telescope. We present spatially resolved images at 450 μm, 870 μm, 1.4 mm, and 2.8 mm, an important transition wavelength range. Longer wavelength emission is dominated by synchrotron radiation from shock-accelerated particles, shorter wavelengths by emission from the largest mass of dust measured in a supernova remnant (>0.2 M {sub ☉}). For the first time we show unambiguously that this dust has formed in the inner ejecta (the cold remnants of the exploded star's core). The dust emission is concentrated at the center of the remnant, so the dust has not yet been affected by the shocks. If a significant fraction survives, and if SN 1987A is typical, supernovae are important cosmological dust producers.
- OSTI ID:
- 22364002
- Journal Information:
- Astrophysical Journal Letters, Vol. 782, Issue 1; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 2041-8205
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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