Authors:

Zachary Pleska

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About Paper:

Core collapse supernovae (CCSN) are energetic explosions initiated by the gravitational collapse of a massive star's core. These events produce heavy elements and dust that provide the foundation for new stars and planets, making them crucial for the evolution of galaxies. Investigating the nucleosynthetic yields of these explosions and the physical characteristics of the produced dust grains (size, composition, distribution) improves our understanding of CCSN explosion dynamics. However, because CCSN are not abundant in the Milky Way Galaxy, the number of observations with high resolution is limited, becoming a leading factor for the poor dust and elemental constraints using current models. We present an analysis of high-resolution images of the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A made by the James Webb Space Telescope that attempts to address this uncertainty. Using images obtained with the NIRCam and MIRI instruments, we measure the spectral energy distribution of gas and dust between 5 and 25 microns and attempt to identify the dominant components of emission. We aim to model these dominant emission features in order to make estimates about dust properties and correlations between the dust and chemical abundances of the supernova ejecta. Our work on this resolved supernova debris field can inform analyses about unresolved extragalactic supernovae. Z.P. acknowledges NSF support from grants PHY-2244297, PHY-2209451 and AST-2206532, and NASA Keywords: Supernovae; Spectroscopy; Digital Imaging; Stellar Evolution; Data Analysis

Source:

Purdue University / 2025

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Co-authors:

Zachary Pleska