2023/10/05 by Zsíros, Szanna, Szalai, Tamás, De Looze, Ilse +39 · 1 citation
#Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA) #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena (astro-ph.HE) #Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR)
paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2310.03448
We present mid-infrared (mid-IR) imaging of the Type IIL supernova (SN) 1980K with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) more than 40 yr post-explosion. SN 1980K, located in the nearby (D≈7 Mpc) "SN factory" galaxy NGC 6946, was serendipitously captured in JWST/MIRI images taken of the field of SN 2004et in the same galaxy. SN 1980K serves as a promising candidate for studying the transitional phase between young SNe and older SN remnants and also provides a great opportunity to investigate its the close environment. SN 1980K can be identified as a clear and bright point source in all eight MIRI filters from F560W up to F2550W. We fit analytical dust models to the mid-IR spectral energy distribution that reveal a large amount (Md ≈ 0.002 M\odot) of Si-dominated dust at Tdust≈ 150 K (accompanied by a hotter dust/gas component), and also computed numerical SED dust models. Radiative transfer modeling of a late-time optical spectrum obtained recently with Keck discloses that an even larger (∼ 0.24-0.58~M\odot) amount of dust is needed in order for selective extinction to explain the asymmetric line profile shapes observed in SN 1980K. As a conclusion, with JWST, we may see i) pre-existing circumstellar dust heated collisionally (or, partly radiatively), analogous to the equatorial ring of SN 1987A, or ii) the mid-IR component of the presumed newly-formed dust, accompanied by much more colder dust present in the ejecta (as suggested by the late-time the optical spectra).