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News release date: 14th January, 2005

LIRIS Observations of SN 2004ao


J-band image (left) and NIR spectrum (right) of SN 2004ao, obtained on June 8, 2004 (t~+90 days) with LIRIS at the William Herschel Telescope. On the image, the nucleus of the host galaxy UGC10862 is visible to the northwest of the supernova. The slit position has been marked with a box enclosing the supernova. North is to the top and East is to the left. On the spectrum, main features have been marked with a vertical line. [ JPEG ]


The spectrum of SN 2004ao shows a set of broad emission bands superimposed on a quite flat continium, indicating that the supernova was close to reach the nebular phase at the date of the observations. Special attention should be paid to the P-Cygni feature, with the absorption at λ~1.043 μm, as well as to the emission bands at λ~0.924, 1.130 and 1.191 μm (all these wavelengths are refered to the host-galaxy rest frame, that corresponds to z=0.0056). Currently, few NIR spectra of core-collapse SNe are found in the literature. In particular, this fact is more evident for Type Ib SNe at phases older than ~one month after maximum. This supernova probably was a "normal" (i.e., non hyper-energetic) Type Ib supernova, despite it was a fairly brigth object.

The SN 2004ao data recorded in this observing test show the feasibility to undertake programs of spectrophotometric follow-up of SNe in the NIR window with LIRIS. An article on this research for inclusion in the next issue of the ING newsletter is in preparation by Gómez, G, López, R., Acosta-Pulido, J. and Manchado, A.



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Last modified: 22 December 2010