Star Go Boom: Observations and Modeling of SN2012au
Supernovae are necessary to understand the formation of our modern universe as they are the source of many of the elements heavier than iron. For this project I studied 2012au, a type Ib superluminous supernova. My object this last summer was to attempt to analyze the pulsar wind nebula (PWN) that formed after the explosion at early times. As there is an opaque cloud of material surrounding the PWN we are unable to observe it directly, so this was approached by constructing a model of the PWN on DU’s High Performance Cluster while continuing observational analysis of this object. This resulted in a computer model of a PWN for the SLIP radiative transfer code and the discovery of a twin receding jet of helium behind the supernova ejecta. Primarily these findings indicate that we must continue developing the simulation code to allow full comparison to the observational data.