Superluminous supernovae from the Dark Energy Survey Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • ABSTRACT We present a sample of 21 hydrogen-free superluminous supernovae (SLSNe-I) and one hydrogen-rich SLSN (SLSN-II) detected during the five-year Dark Energy Survey (DES). These SNe, located in the redshift range 0.220 > z > 1.998, represent the largest homogeneously selected sample of SLSN events at high redshift. We present the observed g, r, i, z light curves for these SNe, which we interpolate using Gaussian processes. The resulting light curves are analysed to determine the luminosity function of SLSNe-I, and their evolutionary time-scales. The DES SLSN-I sample significantly broadens the distribution of SLSN-I light-curve properties when combined with existing samples from the literature. We fit a magnetar model to our SLSNe, and find that this model alone is unable to replicate the behaviour of many of the bolometric light curves. We search the DES SLSN-I light curves for the presence of initial peaks prior to the main light-curve peak. Using a shock breakout model, our Monte Carlo search finds that 3 of our 14 events with pre-max data display such initial peaks. However, 10 events show no evidence for such peaks, in some cases down to an absolute magnitude of >16, suggesting that such features are not ubiquitous to all SLSN-I events. We also identify a red pre-peak feature within the light curve of one SLSN, which is comparable to that observed within SN2018bsz.

published proceedings

  • MONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY

altmetric score

  • 9.18

author list (cited authors)

  • Angus, C. R., Smith, M., Sullivan, M., Inserra, C., Wiseman, P., D'Andrea, C. B., ... Tucker, D. L.

citation count

  • 64

complete list of authors

  • Angus, CR||Smith, M||Sullivan, M||Inserra, C||Wiseman, P||D'Andrea, CB||Thomas, BP||Nichol, RC||Galbany, L||Childress, M||Asorey, J||Brown, PJ||Casas, R||Castander, FJ||Curtin, C||Frohmaier, C||Glazebrook, K||Gruen, D||Gutierrez, C||Kessler, R||Kim, AG||Lidman, C||Macaulay, E||Nugent, P||Pursiainen, M||Sako, M||Soares-Santos, M||Thomas, RC||Abbott, TMC||Avila, S||Bertin, E||Brooks, D||Buckley-Geer, E||Burke, DL||Carnero Rosell, A||Carretero, J||da Costa, LN||De Vicente, J||Desai, S||Diehl, HT||Doel, P||Eifler, TF||Flaugher, B||Fosalba, P||Frieman, J||Garcia-Bellido, J||Gruendl, RA||Gschwend, J||Hartley, WG||Hollowood, DL||Honscheid, K||Hoyle, B||James, DJ||Kuehn, K||Kuropatkin, N||Lahav, O||Lima, M||Maia, MAG||March, M||Marshall, JL||Menanteau, F||Miller, CJ||Miquel, R||Ogando, RLC||Plazas, AA||Romer, AK||Sanchez, E||Schindler, R||Schubnell, M||Sobreira, F||Suchyta, E||Swanson, MEC||Tarle, G||Thomas, D||Tucker, DL

publication date

  • August 2019