Herschel and ALMA find supernovae as dust factories

Mikako Matsuura (Physics and Astronomy, University College London)

The formation of dust by core-collapse supernovae (CCSNe) is one of the key processes in the chemical and physical evolution of supernova ejecta, with implications for the origin of dust in the interstellar media of galaxies. 

The Herschel Space Observatory and the ALMA have provided a unique opportunity to investigate the presence of cool dust in recent CCSNe. Herschel detected broad-band far-infrared emission from SN 1987A in the LMC. In order to fit the observed far-infrared continuum emission, 0.4-0.7 solar masses of cold (T ~ 21 K) dust were estimated to be required (Matsuura et al. 2011). ALMA observations have confirmed that the far-infrared emission is indeed continuum emission from dust grains formed in the supernova ejecta. Our studies show that a significant fraction of the elements synthesised by the supernova have now condensed into dust grains in the ejecta, with implications for our view of the contribution of CCSNe to the dust budgets of galaxies.