Very Deep inside the SN 1987A Core Ejecta: Molecular Structures Seen in 3D

Journal Article · Tue Jun 20 04:00:00 EDT 2017 · Astrophysical Journal Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/AA784C· OSTI ID:22654450

Abellán, F. J.; Marcaide, J. M. ^[1]; Indebetouw, R.; Chevalier, R. ^[2]; Gabler, M.; Janka, H. -Th. ^[3]; Fransson, C.; Lundqvist, P. ^[4]; Spyromilio, J. ^[5]; Burrows, D. N. ^[6]; Cigan, P.; Gomez, H. L.; Matsuura, M. ^[7]; Gaensler, B. M. ^[8]; Kirshner, R. ^[9]; Larsson, J. ^[10]; McCray, R. ^[11]; Ng, C. -Y. ^[12]; Park, S. ^[13]; others, and

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1. Departamento de Astronomía y Astrofísica, Universidad de Valencia, C/Dr. Moliner 50, E-46100 Burjassot (Spain)
2. Department of Astronomy, University of Virginia, P.O. Box 400325, Charlottesville, VA 22904 (United States)
3. Max-Planck-Institut für Astrophysik, Karl-Schwarzschild-Straße 1, D-85748 Garching (Germany)
4. Department of Astronomy, The Oskar Klein Centre, Stockholm University, Alba Nova University Centre, SE-106 91 Stockholm (Sweden)
5. ESO, Karl-Schwarzschild-Straße 2, D-85748 Garching (Germany)
6. Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 (United States)
7. School of Physics and Astronomy, Cardiff University, Queens Buildings, The Parade, Cardiff CF24 3AA (United Kingdom)
8. Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3H4 (Canada)
9. Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138 (United States)
10. KTH, Department of Physics, and the Oskar Klein Centre, AlbaNova, SE-106 91 Stockholm (Sweden)
11. Department of Astronomy, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-3411 (United States)
12. Department of Physics, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong (China)
13. Department of Physics, University of Texas at Arlington, 108 Science Hall, Box 19059, Arlington, TX 76019 (United States)

Most massive stars end their lives in core-collapse supernova explosions and enrich the interstellar medium with explosively nucleosynthesized elements. Following core collapse, the explosion is subject to instabilities as the shock propagates outward through the progenitor star. Observations of the composition and structure of the innermost regions of a core-collapse supernova provide a direct probe of the instabilities and nucleosynthetic products. SN 1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud is one of very few supernovae for which the inner ejecta can be spatially resolved but are not yet strongly affected by interaction with the surroundings. Our observations of SN 1987A with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array are of the highest resolution to date and reveal the detailed morphology of cold molecular gas in the innermost regions of the remnant. The 3D distributions of carbon and silicon monoxide (CO and SiO) emission differ, but both have a central deficit, or torus-like distribution, possibly a result of radioactive heating during the first weeks (“nickel heating”). The size scales of the clumpy distribution are compared quantitatively to models, demonstrating how progenitor and explosion physics can be constrained.

• OSTI ID: 22654450
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal Letters, Journal Name: Astrophysical Journal Letters Journal Issue: 2 Vol. 842; ISSN 2041-8205
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
CARBON
CARBON MONOXIDE
DISTRIBUTION
EMISSION
EXPLOSIONS
HEATING
HYDRODYNAMICS
INSTABILITY
INTERACTIONS
MAGELLANIC CLOUDS
MOLECULAR STRUCTURE
NICKEL
NUCLEOSYNTHESIS
RESOLUTION
SILICON
SILICON OXIDES
SUPERNOVA REMNANTS
SUPERNOVAE