In 2011, the Nobel Prize was awarded to three scientists for discovering that the Universe is expanding at an ever-accelerating rate through observations of distant supernovae.
- Now a team of Indian astronomers observing such distant supernovae have narrowed down the possible mechanisms of explosion of such supernovae which provide key measures of cosmological distances.
- Their detailed study of a supernova called SN 2017hpa, a particular type of supernovae called I a supernova, which exploded in 2017 helped narrow down the explosion mechanism of the supernovae by observations of unburned carbon in the early phase spectra.
- The explosive death of a star as a supernova is one of the most spectacular and catastrophic events in the Universe. Type Ia supernovae are the result of explosions of white dwarfs that exceed their mass beyond the Chandrasekhar limit through accretion of matter.
- Their homogeneous nature makes them extremely good standardizable candles to measure cosmological distances. However, the explosion mechanisms which create these supernovae (SNe), and the exact nature of their progenitor systems (star which is at the origin of a supernova phenomenon) are still not yet clearly understood.
While most SNeIa are homogeneous, a good fraction of these events show diversity in both their light curve as well as spectral properties.
