Submillimetre Emission from Eta Carinae

Abstract

We present critical, long-wavelength observations of Eta Carinae in the submillimetre using SCUBA on the JCMT at 850 and 450 um to confirm the presence of a large mass of warm dust around the central star. We fit a two-component blackbody to the IR-submm spectral energy distribution and estimate between 0.3-0.7 solar masses of dust exists in the nebula depending on the dust absorption properties and the extent of contamination from free-free emission at the SCUBA wavelengths. These results provide further evidence that Eta Carinae's circumstellar nebula contains > 10 solar masses of gas, although this may have been ejected on a longer timescale than previously thought.

arXiv comment7 pages, 5 figures, accepted MNRAS, corrected typos

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• Periastron Passage Triggering of the 19th Century Eruptions of Eta Carinae
• Evidence for Pre-Existing Dust in the Bright Type IIn SN 2010jl
• A Model for the 19th Century Eruption of Eta Carinae: CSM Interaction Like a Scaled-Down Type IIn Supernova
• $\eta$ Carinae's Dusty Homunculus Nebula from Near-Infrared to Submillimeter Wavelengths: Mass, Composition, and Evidence for Fading Opacity
• Submillimetre Variability of Eta Carinae: cool dust within the outer ejecta
• Accretion onto the Companion of Eta Carinae During the Spectroscopic Event. V. the Infrared Decline
• Study of the luminous blue variable star candidate G26.47+0.02 and its environment
• The Interaction of the Eta Carinae Primary Wind with a Century Old Slow Equatorial Ejecta
• Numerical simulations of wind-equatorial gas interaction in eta Carinae