Titanium hidden in dust

Abstract

Cassiopeia A, one of the most intriguing galactic supernova remnants, has been a target of many observational efforts including most recent observations by ALMA, Hubble, Herschel, Spitzer, NuSTAR, Integral, and other observatories. We use recent gamma-ray lines observations of the radioactive products of Cas A supernova explosive nucleosynthesis as well as spectral energy densities derived for Cas A at infrared wavelengths to speculate about the possibility of radioactive 44Ti being locked into large dust grains. This suggestion is also supported by the possible observation of a pre-supernova outburst about 80 years before the actual Cas A supernova explosion in 1671 AD by Italian astronomer G.D. Cassini. The plausibility of such a scenario is discussed also with reference to recent supernovae, and to the contribution of core-collapse supernovae to the overall dust production in the Galaxy.

8 pages, 5 figures; accepted for publication in MNRAS

References in corpus (22)

• A Unified Representation of Gas-Phase Element Depletions in the Interstellar Medium
• Asymmetries in core-collapse supernovae from maps of radioactive ${}^{44}$Ti in CassiopeiaA
• Freshly Formed Dust in the Cassiopeia A Supernova Remnant as Revealed by the Spitzer Space Telescope
• Rapid formation of large dust grains in the luminous supernova SN 2010jl
• A stubbornly large mass of cold dust in the ejecta of Supernova 1987A
• Thermal Emission from Warm Dust in the Most Distant Quasars
• The dust mass in Cassiopeia A from a spatially resolved Herschel analysis
• The timing and location of dust formation in the remnant of SN 1987A
• Hard X-ray emission lines from the decay of Ti-44 in the remnant of supernova 1987A
• The distribution of radioactive ${}^{44}$Ti in Cassiopeia A
• The signature of 44Ti in Cassiopeia A revealed by IBIS/ISGRI on INTEGRAL
• Cassiopeia A: dust factory revealed via submillimetre polarimetry
• A Blast Wave from the 1843 Eruption of Eta Carinae
• No cold dust within the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A
• Interstellar and Ejecta Dust in the Cas A Supernova Remnant
• Radii and Mass-loss Rates of Type IIb Supernova Progenitors
• Dust masses for SN 1980K, SN1993J and Cassiopeia A from red-blue emission line asymmetries
• Spectral and morphological analysis of the remnant of Supernova 1987A with ALMA & ATCA
• Environments of z>5 quasars: searching for protoclusters at submillimetre wavelengths
• Near-Infrared Knots and Dense Fe Ejecta in the Cassiopeia A Supernova Remnant
• Hydrodynamic simulations of the interaction of supernova shock waves with a clumpy environment: the case of the RX J0852.0-4622 (Vela Jr) supernova remnant
• The Korean 1592--1593 Record of a Guest Star: An `impostor' of the Cassiopeia A Supernova?

Cited by in corpus (1)

• ${}^{44}\mathrm{Ti}$ ejecta in young supernova remnants