Nearby Supernova Rates from the Lick Observatory Supernova Search. IV. A Recovery Method for the Delay Time Distribution

Understand

The supernova (SN) delay-time distribution (DTD) - the SN rate versus time that would follow a brief burst of star formation - can shed light on SN progenitors, and on chemical enrichment timescales.

• Previous attempts to recover the DTD have used comparisons of mean SN rates vs.
• redshift to cosmic star-formation history (SFH), or comparison of SN rates among galaxies of different mean ages.
• We present an approach to recover the SN DTD that avoids such averaging.