Here's a really great 5 minute read from the news this morning, about the findings of the recent Type 1a, SN 2011fe.
The early-time light curve observations actually resulted in being able to constrain the 'old-red-giants and; white-dwarfs-in-the-double-degenerate-system' models !
Closest Type Ia supernova in decades solves a cosmic mystery
Some inspirational words here …
Quote:
"It is rare that you have eureka moments in science, but it happened four times on this supernova," says Andy Howell, coleader of PTF's SN Ia team: "The super-early discovery; the crazy first spectrum; when we figured out it had to be a white dwarf; and then, the Holy Grail, when we figured out details of the second star."
Howell adds, "We're like Captain Ahab … except our white whale is a white dwarf. We're obsessed with proving they cause supernovae, but the evidence has been eluding us for decades." This time, he says, "We got our whale … and we lived."
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The paper will appear in the Dec 15 issue of Nature and sounds like a very interesting read.
Cheers