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Caltech

Astronomy Colloquium

Wednesday, October 26, 2022
4:00pm to 5:00pm
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Cahill, Hameetman Auditorium
The Landscape of Relativistic Stellar Explosions
Anna Ho, Assistant Professor of Astronomy, Cornell University,

For the last half-century, relativistic outflows accompanying the final collapse of massive stars have predominantly been detected via high-energy emission, as long-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Yet, it has long been hypothesized that GRBs are the tip of the iceberg of relativistic stellar explosions, because the conditions required to produce and detect a GRB are contrived. I will present results from a search for relativistic stellar explosions using optical time-domain surveys. The emerging zoo includes afterglows at cosmological distances with no detected GRB, supernovae with luminous X-ray and radio emission, and transients powered by circumstellar interaction such as AT2018cow. An understanding of the origin of these events and their relation to GRBs will be enabled by upcoming time-domain surveys in other bands, particularly X-ray, UV, and submillimeter. 

To view this talk via YouTube, please visit: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLb1880Rn0qkKFkWyROUq1kRlgCsuBTrnd

For more information, please contact Dimitri Mawet by email at [email protected] or visit http://www.astro.caltech.edu.