Connecting the Light Curves of Type IIP Supernovae to the Properties of Their Progenitors

Journal Article · 25 July 2022 · The Astrophysical Journal

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ac77f3 · OSTI ID:1877937

Barker, Brandon L. ; Harris, Chelsea E. ; Warren, MacKenzie L. ; O’Connor, Evan P. ; Couch, Sean M.

Abstract Observations of core-collapse supernovae (CCSNe) reveal a wealth of information about the dynamics of the supernova ejecta and its composition but very little direct information about the progenitor. Constraining properties of the progenitor and the explosion requires coupling the observations with a theoretical model of the explosion. Here we begin with the CCSN simulations of Couch et al., which use a nonparametric treatment of the neutrino transport while also accounting for turbulence and convection. In this work we use the SuperNova Explosion Code to evolve the CCSN hydrodynamics to later times and compute bolometric light curves. Focusing on Type IIP SNe (SNe IIP), we then (1) directly compare the theoretical STIR explosions to observations and (2) assess how properties of the progenitor’s core can be estimated from optical photometry in the plateau phase alone. First, the distribution of plateau luminosities ( L ₅₀ ) and ejecta velocities achieved by our simulations is similar to the observed distributions. Second, we fit our models to the light curves and velocity evolution of some well-observed SNe. Third, we recover well-known correlations, as well as the difficulty of connecting any one SN property to zero-age main-sequence mass. Finally, we show that there is a usable, linear correlation between iron core mass and L ₅₀ such that optical photometry alone of SNe IIP can give us insights into the cores of massive stars. Illustrating this by application to a few SNe, we find iron core masses of 1.3–1.5 M _⊙ with typical errors of 0.05 M _⊙ . Data are publicly available online on Zenodo: doi: 10.5281/zenodo.6631964 .

• Research Organization: Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: Michigan State University; National Science Foundation (NSF); Packard Foundation; Swedish Research Council; USDOE; USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Nuclear Physics (NP)
• Grant/Contract Number: SC0015904; SC0017955
• OSTI ID: 1877937
• Journal Information: The Astrophysical Journal, Journal Name: The Astrophysical Journal Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 934; ISSN 0004-637X
• Publisher: American Astronomical SocietyCopyright Statement
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English