A New View of the Circumstellar Environment of SN 1987A

Abstract

We summarize the analysis of a uniform set of both previously-known and newly-discovered scattered-light echoes, detected within 30" of SN 1987A in ten years of optical imaging, and with which we have constructed the most complete three-dimensional model of the progenitor's circumstellar environment. Surrounding the SN is a richly-structured bipolar nebula. An outer, double-lobed ``peanut,'' which we believe is the contact discontinuity between the red supergiant and main sequence winds, is a prolate shell extending 28 ly along the poles and 11 ly near the equator. Napoleon's Hat, previously believed to be an independent structure, is the waist of this peanut, which is pinched to a radius of 6 ly. Interior, the innermost circumstellar material lies along a cylindrical hourglass, 1 ly in radius and 4 ly long, which connects to the peanut by a thick equatorial disk. The nebulae are inclined 41o south and 8o east of the line of sight, slightly elliptical in cross section, and marginally offset west of the SN. The 3-D geometry of the three circumstellar rings is studied, suggesting the equatorial ring is elliptical (b/a<0.98), and spatially offset in the same direction as the hourglass. Dust-scattering models suggest that between the hourglass and bipolar lobes: the gas density drops from 1--3 cm^{-3} to >0.03 cm^{-3}; the maximum dust-grain size increases from ~0.2 micron to 2 micron; and the Si:C dust ratio decreases. The nebulae have a total mass of ~1.7 Msun, yielding a red-supergiant mass loss around 5*10^{-6} Msun yr^{-1}.

arXiv commentAccepted for publication in ApJ 2/14/05. 16 pages in emualteapj format

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• The Three-Dimensional Circumstellar Environment of SN 1987A
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• Matter Mixing in Aspherical Core-collapse Supernovae: Three-dimensional Simulations with Single Star and Binary Merger Progenitor Models for SN 1987A
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• Time evolution of the line emission from the inner circumstellar ring of SN 1987A and its hot spots
• New Observations of the Very Luminous Supernova 2006gy: Evidence for Echoes
• Late Spectral Evolution of the Ejecta and Reverse Shock in SN1987A
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