›Supernovae Workshop

The forthcoming ISSI Workshop “Supernovae” is devoted to an in-depth examination of complex astrophysical events with extreme energy release via multi-wavelength observations and modeling. Supernova explosions at the final stages of stellar evolution are known to be the major sources of chemical elements, turbulent energy and relativistic particles in galaxies. They are a key element of galactic ecology and evolution both in starburst and normal galaxies. The extreme physical conditions that are present in supernovae are unreachable in terrestrial laboratories and therefore these sources provide unique opportunities to test physical laws under extreme conditions. Moreover, the study of supernovae has led to new discoveries in fundamental physics as demonstrated by advances made in dark energy cosmology from a thorough analysis of Type Ia supernovae as “standard candles” to measure cosmological distances. Furthermore, supernovae are related to the brightest cosmological transients – gamma-ray bursts — and to the origin of magnetars, objects with the highest magnetic fields ever recorded and a subject of previous astrophysical ISSI workshops.

The following issues of current interest are to be addressed in the workshop:

(i) The current status and perspective of Type Ia and core collapse supernova observations and modeling
(ii) The role of Type Ia supernovae in cosmology
(iii) Stellar and supernovae nucleosynthesis
(iv) Supernova progenitors and environments
(v) Cosmic ray, neutrino, and dust production in supernovae

Special attention will be given to the physics of unusual supernovae including superluminous, faint, and fast evolving supernovae. Future multi-messenger studies in the entire band from radio to gamma-rays, combined with the fast growing neutrino and gravitational wave facilities, will be discussed in the workshop and presented in the ISSI Springer book.