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Upper Limits to the Prompt X-ray Flux from Supernova 1987a

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 April 2016

P. J. Edwards*
Affiliation:
Department of Electronics Engineering and Applied Physics Canberra College of Advanced Education

Abstract

The literature contains numerous predictions of an X-ray pulse associated with the emergence of the shock-wave at the surface of a star undergoing a supernova explosion. Applied to supernova 1987a, these suggest a small, solar-flare like event lasting about a minute with a terrestrial flux of order 1 μWm-2 and a black-body temperature between 106K and 107K occurring between 0900 and 1000 UT on February 23, 1987. Unfortunately, no direct X-ray observations appear to have been made. However, such an event would be expected to give rise to an observable enhancement of ionization in the upper D-region of the ionosphere. The absence of a detectable perturbation in VLF radio signals propagating in the earth-ionosphere waveguide sets upper limits to the X-ray flux and temperature below those predicted.

Type
Spectroscopy
Copyright
Copyright © Astronomical Society of Australia 1987

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