On the Interpretation of Supernova Light Echo Profiles and Spectra

The light echo systems of historical supernovae in the Milky Way and local group galaxies provide an unprecedented opportunity to reveal the effects of asymmetry on observables, particularly optical spectra. Scattering dust at different locations on the light echo ellipsoid witnesses the supernova from different perspectives and the light consequently scattered towards Earth preserves the shape of line profile variations introduced by asymmetries in the supernova photosphere. However, the interpretation of supernova light echo spectra to date has not involved a detailed consideration of the effects of outburst duration and geometrical scattering modifications due to finite scattering dust filament dimension, inclination, and image point-spread function and spectrograph slit width. In this paper, we explore the implications of these factors and present a framework for future resolved supernova light echo spectra interpretation, and test it against Cas A and SN 1987A light echo spectra. We conclude that the full modeling of the dimensions and orientation of the scattering dust using the observed light echoes at two or more epochs is critical for the correct interpretation of light echo spectra. Indeed, without doing so one might falsely conclude that differences exist when none are actually present.Comment: 18 pages, 22 figures, accepted for publication in Ap

Spectroscopy of High-Redshift Supernovae from the ESSENCE Project: The First Four Years

We present the results of spectroscopic observations from the ESSENCE high-redshift supernova (SN) survey during its first four years of operation. This sample includes spectra of all SNe Ia whose light curves were presented by Miknaitis et al. (2007) and used in the cosmological analyses of Davis et al. (2007) and Wood-Vasey et al. (2007). The sample represents 273 hours of spectroscopic observations with 6.5 - 10-m-class telescopes of objects detected and selected for spectroscopy by the ESSENCE team. We present 174 spectra of 156 objects. Combining this sample with that of Matheson et al. (2005), we have a total sample of 329 spectra of 274 objects. From this, we are able to spectroscopically classify 118 Type Ia SNe. As the survey has matured, the efficiency of classifying SNe Ia has remained constant while we have observed both higher-redshift SNe Ia and SNe Ia farther from maximum brightness. Examining the subsample of SNe Ia with host-galaxy redshifts shows that redshifts derived from only the SN Ia spectra are consistent with redshifts found from host-galaxy spectra. Moreover, the phases derived from only the SN Ia spectra are consistent with those derived from light-curve fits. By comparing our spectra to local templates, we find that the rate of objects similar to the overluminous SN 1991T and the underluminous SN 1991bg in our sample are consistent with that of the local sample. We do note, however, that we detect no object spectroscopically or photometrically similar to SN 1991bg. Although systematic effects could reduce the high-redshift rate we expect based on the low-redshift surveys, it is possible that SN 1991bg-like SNe Ia are less prevalent at high redshift.Comment: 21 pages, 17 figures, accepted to A

Mass-loaded spherical accretion flows

We have calculated the evolution of spherical accretion flows undergoing mass-loading from embedded clouds through either conduction or hydrodynamical ablation. We have observed the effect of varying the ratios of the mass-loading timescale and the cooling timescale to the ballistic crossing timescale through the mass-loading region. We have also varied the ratio of the potential energy of a particle injected into the flow near the outer region of mass-loading to the temperature at which a minimum occurs in the cooling curve. The two types of mass-loading produce qualitatively different types of behaviour in the accretion flow, since mass-loading through conduction requires the ambient gas to be hot, whereas mass ablation from clumps occurs throughout the flow. Higher ratios of injected to accreted mass typically occur with hydrodynamical ablation, in agreement with previous work on wind-blown bubbles and supernova remnants. We find that mass-loading damps the radiative overstability of such flows, in agreement with our earlier work. If the mass-loading is high enough it can stabilize the accretion shock at a constant radius, yielding an almost isothermal subsonic post-shock flow. Such solutions may be relevant to cooling flows onto massive galaxies. Mass-loading can also lead to the formation of isolated shells of high temperature material, separated by gas at cooler temperatures

Optical Spectra of 73 Stripped-Envelope Core-Collapse Supernovae

We present 645 optical spectra of 73 supernovae (SNe) of Types IIb, Ib, Ic, and broad-lined Ic. All of these types are attributed to the core collapse of massive stars, with varying degrees of intact H and He envelopes before explosion. The SNe in our sample have a mean redshift = 4200 km/s. Most of these spectra were gathered at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) between 2004 and 2009. For 53 SNe, these are the first published spectra. The data coverage range from mere identification (1-3 spectra) for a few SNe to extensive series of observations (10-30 spectra) that trace the spectral evolution for others, with an average of 9 spectra per SN. For 44 SNe of the 73 SNe presented here, we have well-determined dates of maximum light to determine the phase of each spectrum. Our sample constitutes the most extensive spectral library of stripped-envelope SNe to date. We provide very early coverage (as early as 30 days before V-band max) for photospheric spectra, as well as late-time nebular coverage when the innermost regions of the SNe are visible (as late as 2 years after explosion, while for SN1993J, we have data as late as 11.6 years). This data set has homogeneous observations and reductions that allow us to study the spectroscopic diversity of these classes of stripped SNe and to compare these to SNe associated with gamma-ray bursts. We undertake these matters in follow-up papers.Comment: Published by the Astronomical Journal in May 2015. All spectra are publicly available at the CfA SN archive: http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/supernova/SNarchive.html . A companion paper on constructing SNID templates based on these spectra is by Liu & Modjaz (2014) and the resulting SNID templates are available from the NYU website: http://cosmo.nyu.edu/SNYU/spectra

High-contrast spectroscopy of SCR J1845-6357 B

Spectral characterization of sub-stellar companions is essential to understand their composition and formation processes. However, the large contrast ratio of the brightness of each object to that of its parent star limits our ability to extract a clean spectrum, free from any significant contribution from the star. During the development of the long slit spectroscopy (LSS) mode of IRDIS, the dual-band imager and spectrograph of SPHERE, we proposed a data analysis method to estimate and remove the contributions of the stellar spectrum. This method has never been tested on real data because of the lack of instrumentation capable of combining adaptive optics (AO), coronagraphy, and LSS. Nonetheless, a similar attenuation of the star can be obtained using a particular observing configuration. Test data were acquired using the AO-assisted spectrograph VLT/NACO. We obtained new J- and H-band spectra of SCR J1845-6357 B, a T6 companion to a nearby (3.85\pm0.02 pc) M8 star. This system is a well-suited benchmark as it is relatively wide (~1.0") with a modest contrast ratio (~4 mag), and a previously published JHK spectrum is available for reference. We demonstrate that (1) our method is efficient at estimating and removing the stellar contribution, (2) it allows to properly recover the spectral shape of the companion, and (3) it is essential to obtain an unbiased estimation of physical parameters. We also show that the slit configuration associated with this method allows us to use long exposure times with high throughput producing high signal-to-noise ratio data. However, the signal of the companion gets over-subtracted, particularly in our J-band data, compelling us to use a fake companion spectrum to estimate and compensate for the loss of flux. Finally, we report a new astrometric measurement of the position of the companion (sep = 0.817", PA = 227.92 deg).Comment: 11 pages, 8 figures, 4 tables. Accepted for publication in A&

Steady shocks around black holes produced by sub-keplerian flows with negative energy

We discuss a special case of formation of axisymmetric shocks in the accretion flow of ideal gas onto a Schwarzschild black hole: when the total energy of the flow is negative. The result of our analysis enlarges the parameter space for which these steady shocks are exhibited in the accretion of gas rotating around relativistic stellar objects. Since keplerian disks have negative total energy, we guess that, in this energy range, the production of the shock phenomenon might be easier than in the case of positive energy. So our outcome reinforces the view that sub-keplerian flows of matter may significantly affect the physics of the high energy radiation emission from black hole candidates. We give a simple procedure to obtain analytically the position of the shocks. The comparison of the analytical results with the data of 1D and 2D axisymmetric numerical simulations confirms that the shocks form and are stable.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, accepted by MNRAS on 10 November 200

Repetitions in infinite palindrome-rich words

Rich words are characterized by containing the maximum possible number of distinct palindromes. Several characteristic properties of rich words have been studied; yet the analysis of repetitions in rich words still involves some interesting open problems. We address lower bounds on the repetition threshold of infinite rich words over 2 and 3-letter alphabets, and construct a candidate infinite rich word over the alphabet $\Sigma_2=\{0,1\}$ with a small critical exponent of $2+\sqrt{2}/2$. This represents the first progress on an open problem of Vesti from 2017.Comment: 12 page

The formation of broad emission line regions in supernova-QSO wind interactions: II. 2D calculations

One aspect of supernova remnant evolution that is relatively unstudied is the influence of an AGN environment. A high density ambient medium and a nearby powerful continuum source will assist the cooling of shocked ejecta and swept-up gas. Motion of the surrounding medium relative to the remnant will also affect the remnant morphology. In an extension to previous work we have performed 2D hydrodynamical calculations of SNR evolution in an AGN environment, and have determined the evolutionary behaviour of cold gas in the remnant. The cold gas will contribute to the observed broad line emission in AGNs, and we present preliminary theoretical line profiles from our calculations. A more detailed comparison with observations will be performed in future work. The SNR-AGN interaction may be also useful as a diagnostic of AGN winds

Wolf-Rayet and LBV Nebulae as the Result of Variable and Non-Spherical Stellar Winds

The physical basis for interpreting observations of nebular morphology around massive stars in terms of the evolution of the central stars is reviewed, and examples are discussed, including NGC 6888, OMC-1, and eta Carinae.Comment: To be published in the Proceedings of IAU Colloquium 169 on Variable and Non-Spherical Stellar Winds in Luminous Hot Stars, ed. B. Wolf (Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg). 7 pages, including 5 figures. A full-resolution version of fig 4 is available in the version at http://www.mpia-hd.mpg.de/theory/preprints.html#maclo