Title: Supernova SN2006gy as a first ever Quark Nova? Authors: Denis Leahy, Rachid Ouyed (University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada) (Version v2)
The most luminous Supernova SN2006gy (more than a 100 times brighter than a typical supernova) has been a challenge to explain by standard models. For example, pair instability supernovae which are luminous enough seem to have too slow a rise, and core collapse supernovae do not seem to be luminous enough. We present an alternative scenario involving the quark-nova phenomenon (an explosive transition of the newly born neutron star to a quark star) in which a second explosion (delayed) occurs inside the ejecta of a normal supernova. The reheated supernova ejecta can radiate at higher levels for longer periods of time primarily due to reduced adiabatic expansion losses, unlike the standard supernova case. We find an encouraging match between the resulting lightcurve and that observed in the case of SN2006gy suggesting that we might have at hand the first ever signature of a quark-nova.
The breakdown of matter into its tiniest quark components in a star's core may have triggered the brightest supernova ever seen, a controversial new study says. If correct, this would be the first time anyone has seen the birth of an exotic object called a quark star. On 18 September 2006, astronomers observed the record-breaking supernova, called 2006gy, and were shocked to find that it was intrinsically about 100 times brighter than typical stellar explosions. To explain its extreme power, its discoverers invoked an unusual argument based on the creation of pairings of matter and antimatter particles inside a massive star. Now, Denis Leahy and Rachid Ouyed, both of the University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada, have proposed an even more exotic scenario the fantastically violent birth of an object called a quark star.
Wide-field Infrared Image of SN 2006gy Expand (256kb, 800 x 773)
This image is a wide-field infrared view from the PAIRITEL telescope of the galaxy NGC 1260. NGC 1260 is located about 240 million light years away. Credit: PAIRITEL/UC Berkeley/J.Bloom
Position (J2000): RA 03h 17m 27.10s | Dec +41º 24' 19.50"
KABOOM indeed. In a cascade of superlatives, astronomers reported that they had seen the brightest and most powerful stellar explosion ever recorded. The cataclysm - a monster more than 100 times as energetic as the typical supernova in which the more massive stars end their lives - may be an example, they said, of a completely new type of explosion. Such a blast, proposed but never seen, would explain how the earliest and most massive stars in the universe ended their lives and strewed new elements across space to fertilise future stars and planets. Read more
Left:Ks band image. The SN (marked) is clearly resolved from the galaxy nucleus. right: J-band image after subtracting the best fit Sersic profile from the galaxy and a Gaussian profile from the SN using Gal-Fit (Peng et al. 2002). The Sersic model parameters are as follows: index of 3.7, an effective radius of 34 , an axial ratio of 0.51, and a position angle of 80deg. A dust lane (white band) is seen southward of the galaxy nucleus. Based on three 2MASS sources, we derived the galaxy nucleus position: a = 03h17m27.s241, d = +4124m18.55 and the SN position (end numbers): 27s.158 (a) and 18.88 (d ). The astrometric solution has rms of 0.04 and 0.01 in a and d , respectively. Credit: E. O. OFEK, P. B. CAMERON, M. M. KASLIWAL, A. GAL-YAM, A. RAU, S. R. KULKARNI, D. A. FRAIL, P. CHANDRA ,S. B. CENKO1, A. M. SODERBERG & S. IMMLER.
The brightest stellar explosion ever recorded may be a long-sought new type of supernova, according to observations by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and ground-based optical telescopes. This discovery indicates that violent explosions of extremely massive stars were relatively common in the early universe, and that a similar explosion may be ready to go off in our own galaxy.
The brightest supernova ever recorded may have been triggered by an exotic process involving antimatter in an extremely massive star, a new study says. The explosion may offer a rare glimpse of how the universe's first generation of stars died. The explosion was first spotted on 18 September 2006 and named SN 2006gy. It quickly became apparent that it was something out of the ordinary
"This was a truly monstrous explosion, a hundred times more energetic than a typical supernova. That means the star that exploded might have been as massive as a star can get, about 150 times that of our sun. We've never seen that before" - Nathan Smith of the University of California at Berkeley, who led a team of astronomers from California and the University of Texas in Austin.