SUBARU HDS Observations of a Balmer-Dominated Shock in Tycho's Supernova Remnant

Abstract

We present an Ha spectral observation of a Balmer-dominated shock on the eastern side of Tycho's supernova remnant using the Subaru Telescope. Utilizing the High Dispersion Spectrograph (HDS), we measure the spatial variation of the line profile between preshock and postshock gas. Our observation clearly shows a broadening and centroid shift of the narrow-component postshock Ha line relative to the Ha emission from the preshock gas. The observation supports the existence of a thin precursor where gas is heated and accelerated ahead of the shock. Furthermore, the spatial profile of the emission ahead of the Balmer filament shows a gradual gradient in the Ha intensity and line width ahead of the shock. We propose that this region (~10^16 cm) is likely to be the spatially resolved precursor. The line width increases from ~30 up to ~45 km/s, and its central velocity shows a redshift of ~5 km/s across the shock front. The characteristics of the precursor are consistent with a cosmic-ray precursor, although the possibility of a fast neutral precursor is not ruled out.

arXiv comment4 pages, 3 figures, The paper will be published in the April 20, 2007 issue of the Astrophysical Journal, 659, L133

References in corpus (6)

• The Wisconsin H-Alpha Mapper Northern Sky Survey
• Cosmic Ray Acceleration at the Forward Shock in Tycho's Supernova Remnant: Evidence from Chandra X-ray Observations
• Balmer-Dominated Spectra of Nonradiative Shocks in the Cygnus Loop, RCW 86 and Tycho Supernova Remnants
• High Resolution Spectroscopy of Balmer-Dominated Shocks in the RCW 86, Kepler and SN 1006 Supernova Remnants
• The high energy gamma-ray emission expected from Tycho's supernova remnant
• The environment of Tycho: possible interaction with molecular cloud

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