CaltechAUTHORS
Published March 1, 2012 | Version Published
Journal Article Open

Evidence for a Compact Wolf-Rayet Progenitor for the Type Ic Supernova PTF 10vgv

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon California Institute of Technology
  • 2. ROR icon Weizmann Institute of Science
  • 3. ROR icon National Radio Astronomy Observatory
  • 4. ROR icon Tel Aviv University
  • 5. ROR icon Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics
  • 6. ROR icon University of California, Berkeley
  • 7. ROR icon Pennsylvania State University
  • 8. ROR icon Hebrew University of Jerusalem
  • 9. ROR icon University of Toronto
  • 10. ROR icon Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

Abstract

We present the discovery of PTF 10vgv, a Type Ic supernova (SN) detected by the Palomar Transient Factory, using the Palomar 48 inch telescope (P48). R-band observations of the PTF 10vgv field with P48 probe the SN emission from its very early phases (about two weeks before R-band maximum) and set limits on its flux in the week prior to the discovery. Our sensitive upper limits and early detections constrain the post-shock-breakout luminosity of this event. Via comparison to numerical (analytical) models, we derive an upper-limit of R ≾ 4.5 R_☉ (R ≾ 1 R_☉) on the radius of the progenitor star, a direct indication in favor of a compact Wolf-Rayet star. Applying a similar analysis to the historical observations of SN 1994I yields R ≾ 1/4 R_☉ for the progenitor radius of this SN.

Additional Information

© 2012 American Astronomical Society. Received 2011 October 25; accepted 2012 January 4; published 2012 February 8. We thank Boaz Katz and Eli Waxman for useful comments. PTF is a collaboration of Caltech, LCOGT, the Weizmann Institute, LBNL, Oxford, Columbia, IPAC, and UC Berkeley. Staff and computational resources were provided by NERSC, supported by the DOE Office of Science. Lick Observatory and the Kast spectrograph are operated by the University of California. HET and its LRS are supported by UT Austin, the Pennsylvania State University, Stanford, Ludwig-Maximilians- Universität München, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, and the Instituto de Astronomia de la Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico. The EVLA is operated by NRAO for the NSF, under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc. We thank the staffs of the above observatories for their assistance. A.G. and S.R.K. acknowledge support from the BSF; A.G. further acknowledges support from the ISF, FP7/IRG, Minerva, the Sieff Foundation, and the German–Israeli Fund (GIF). A.V.F. and his group at UC Berkeley acknowledge generous financial assistance from Gary & Cynthia Bengier, the Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund, the TABASGO Foundation, and NSF grant AST-0908886. A.C. acknowledges support from LIGO, which was constructed by Caltech and MIT with funding from the NSF under cooperative agreementPHY-0757058, and partial support from NASA/Swift grant NNH10ZDA001N.

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Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
29930
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20120402-091946766

Funding

Department of Energy (DOE)
University of Texas
Pennsylvania State University
Stanford University
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Instituto de Astronomy de la Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico
Binational Science Foundation (USA-Israel)
Israel Science Foundation
European Research Council (ERC)
Minerva
Sieff Foundation
German-Israeli Foundation for Research and Development
Gary and Cynthia Bengier
Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund
TABASGO Foundation
NSF
AST-0908886
LIGO
NSF
PHY-0757058
NASA
NNH10ZDA001N

Dates

Created
2012-04-02
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2021-11-09
Created from EPrint's last_modified field

Caltech Custom Metadata

Caltech groups
TAPIR, Palomar Transient Factory, LIGO, Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences (GPS)