Hunting for the progenitor of SN 1006: High resolution spectroscopic search with the FLAMES instrument

Understand

Type Ia supernovae play a significant role in the evolution of the Universe and have a wide range of applications.

• It is widely believed that these events are the thermonuclear explosions of carbon-oxygen white dwarfs close to the Chandrasekhar mass (1.38 M\odot).
• However, CO white dwarfs are born with masses much below the Chandrasekhar limit and thus require mass accretion to become Type Ia supernovae.
• There are two main scenarios for accretion.