English

Can the violent merger of white dwarfs explain the slowest declining Type Ia supernova SN 2011aa?

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena 2022-09-02 v1

Abstract

We present optical observations and Monte Carlo radiative transfer modeling of the Type Ia supernova SN 2011aa. With a Δm15(B)\Delta m_{15} (B) of 0.59±0.070.59 \pm 0.07 mag and a peak magnitude MBM_{\rm B} of 19.30±0.27-19.30 \pm 0.27 mag, SN 2011aa has the slowest decline rate among SNe Ia. The secondary maximum in the II-band is absent or equally bright as the primary maximum. The velocity of C II is lower than the velocity of Si II. This indicates either presence of C at lower velocities than Si or a line of sight effect. Application of Arnett's radiation diffusion model to the bolometric light curve indicates a massive ejecta Mej 1.82.6 MM_{\rm{ej}} ~ 1.8 - 2.6~M_{\odot}. The slow decline rate and large ejecta mass, with a normal peak magnitude, are well explained by double degenerate, violent merger explosion model. The synthetic spectra and light curves generated with SEDONA considering a violent merger density profile match the observations.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2209.00569,
  title  = {Can the violent merger of white dwarfs explain the slowest declining Type Ia supernova SN 2011aa?},
  author = {Anirban Dutta and G C Anupama and N K Chakradhari and D K Sahu},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2209.00569},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

12 pages, 4 figures, 1 table. Accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal Letters