Progenitors of early-time interacting supernovae
Abstract
We compute an extensive set of early-time spectra of supernovae interacting with circumstellar material using the radiative transfer code CMFGEN. Our models are applicable to events observed from 1 to a few days after explosion. Using these models, we constrain the progenitor and explosion properties of a sample of 17 observed interacting supernovae at early times. Because massive stars have strong mass-loss, these spectra provide valuable information about supernova progenitors, such as mass-loss rates, wind velocities, and surface abundances. We show that these events span a wide range of explosion and progenitor properties, exhibiting supernova luminosities in the 108 to 1012 L⊙ range, temperatures from 10 000 to 60 000 K, progenitor mass-loss rates from a few 10-4 up to 1 M⊙ yr-1, wind velocities from 100 to 800 km s-1, and surface abundances from solar-like to H-depleted. Our results suggest that many progenitors of supernovae interacting with circumstellar material have significantly increased mass-loss before explosion compared to what massive stars show during the rest of their lifetimes. We also infer a lack of correlation between surface abundances and mass-loss rates. This may point to the pre-explosion mass-loss mechanism being independent of stellar mass. We find that the majority of these events have CNO-processed surface abundances. In the single star scenario this points to a preference towards high-mass RSGs as progenitors of interacting SNe, while binary evolution could impact this conclusion. Our models are publicly available and readily applicable to analyse results from ongoing and future large-scale surveys such as the Zwicky Transient Factory.
- Publication:
-
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Pub Date:
- August 2020
- DOI:
- 10.1093/mnras/staa1540
- arXiv:
- arXiv:2001.07651
- Bibcode:
- 2020MNRAS.496.1325B
- Keywords:
-
- Radiative transfer;
- transients: supernovae;
- stars: massive;
- Astrophysics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics;
- Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies
- E-Print:
- Accepted for publication in MNRAS. All the synthetic spectra presented in this article are publicly available and can be downloaded via WISeREP (https://wiserep.weizmann.ac.il/). 32 pages, 25 figures