Schedule Aug 21, 2009
HST and Ground-Based Observations of SN 2008A: A Peculiar 2002cx-like Type Ia Supernova
Curtis McCully (Rutgers)

We present HST and ground observations of SN 2008A. The early-time spectra and light curves show that SN 2008A is very similar to SN 2002cx and SN 2005hk, making it part of the SN 2002cx-like subclass of peculiar type Ia supernovae (Jha et al. 2006). Late-time spectroscopy of members of this class, including SN 2008A, provide evidence for significant amounts of high density, low velocity material. Even though this is a very uniform class of Type Ia supernovae, from HST imaging we find that SN 2008A is declining faster at late times than SN 2005hk. We will obtain a second epoch of HST imaging in late August 2009 to follow SN 2008A and constrain models for this subclass, including the possibility of a pure deflagration explosion.

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