Speaker
Mr
Matthew Gilmer
(North Carolina State University)
Description
Matthew Gilmer1, Alexandra Kozyreva2, Raphael Hirschi2, Carla Frohlich1
1 North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695-8202
2 Astrophysics group, Keele University, Keele, Staffordshire, ST5 5BG, UK
The new highly diverse class of supernovae, Super Luminous Supernovae (SLSNe), along with observations of Very Massive Stars (VMS) in the Local Universe have helped to revive interest in Pair-Instability Supernovae (PISNe; originally postulated in 1967) over the last decade. While PISN models have had no trouble explaining the enormous amount of light that defines a SLSN, they have heretofore been unable to reproduce the light curve shape and spectral evolution seen in such events. The majority of SLSNe evolve too fast and/or are too blue in color to be matched with existing PISN model predictions. However, our work indicates that certain slowly-evolving hydrogen-poor SLSNe, such as PTF12dam (one of many recent events with similar properties), might be explained by the PISN of a stripped carbon-oxygen core with considerable mixing of radioactive nickel in the ejecta. Here we present 1D, 2D, and 3D hydrodynamical simulations of PISNe computed with FLASH in order to study the effects of natural mixing of nickel on the light curve shape. We use as inputs stellar models of VMS evolved with the GENEVA code. The light curves are calculated with radiation-hydrodynamics code STELLA and comparisons are made to observations of SLSNe.
Primary author
Mr
Matthew Gilmer
(North Carolina State University)
