No Arabic abstract
We analyze the magnitude-redshift data of type Ia supernovae included in the Union and Union2 compilations in the framework of an anisotropic Bianchi type I cosmological model and in the presence of a dark energy fluid with anisotropic equation of state. We find that the amount of deviation from isotropy of the equation of state of dark energy, the skewness delta, and the present level of anisotropy of the large-scale geometry of the Universe, the actual shear Sigma_0, are constrained in the ranges -0.16 < delta < 0.12 and -0.012 < Sigma_0 < 0.012 (1sigma C.L.) by Union2 data. Supernova data are then compatible with a standard isotropic universe (delta = Sigma_0 = 0), but a large level of anisotropy, both in the geometry of the Universe and in the equation of state of dark energy, is allowed.
The standard cosmology strongly relies upon the Cosmological Principle, which consists on the hypotheses of large scale isotropy and homogeneity of the Universe. Testing these assumptions is, therefore, crucial to determining if there are deviations from the standard cosmological paradigm. In this paper, we use the latest type Ia supernova compilations, namely JLA and Union2.1 to test the cosmological isotropy at low redshift ranges ($z<0.1$). This is performed through a Bayesian selection analysis, in which we compare the standard, isotropic model, with another one including a dipole correction due to peculiar velocities. We find that the Union2.1 sample favors the dipole-corrected model, but the opposite happens for the JLA. Nonetheless, the velocity dipole results are in good agreement with previous analyses carried out with both datasets. We conclude that there are no significant indications for large anisotropic signals from nearby supernova compilations, albeit this test should be greatly improved with the upcoming cosmological surveys.
An important problem in precision cosmology is the determination of the effects of averaging and backreaction on observational predictions, particularly in view of the wealth of new observational data and improved statistical techniques. In this paper, we discuss the observational viability of a class of averaged cosmologies which consist of a simple parametrized phenomenological two-scale backreaction model with decoupled spatial curvature parameters. We perform a Bayesian model selection analysis and find that this class of averaged phenomenological cosmological models is favored with respect to the standard $Lambda$CDM cosmological scenario when a joint analysis of current SNe Ia and BAO data is performed. In particular, the analysis provides observational evidence for non-trivial spatial curvature.
We use multi-wavelength, matched aperture, integrated photometry from GALEX, SDSS and the RC3 to estimate the physical properties of 166 nearby galaxies hosting 168 well-observed Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia). Our data corroborate well-known features that have been seen in other SN Ia samples. Specifically, hosts with active star formation produce brighter and slower SNe Ia on average, and hosts with luminosity-weighted ages older than 1 Gyr produce on average more faint, fast and fewer bright, slow SNe Ia than younger hosts. New results include that in our sample, the faintest and fastest SNe Ia occur only in galaxies exceeding a stellar mass threshhold of ~10^10 M_sun, indicating that their progenitors must arise in populations that are older and/or more metal rich than the general SN Ia population. A low host extinction sub-sample hints at a residual trend in peak luminosity with host age, after correcting for light-curve shape, giving the appearance that older hosts produce less-extincted SNe Ia on average. This has implications for cosmological fitting of SNe Ia and suggests that host age could be useful as a parameter in the fitting. Converting host mass to metallicity and computing 56Ni mass from the supernova light curves, we find that our local sample is consistent with a model that predicts a shallow trend between stellar metallicity and the 56Ni mass that powers the explosion, but we cannot rule out the absence of a trend. We measure a correlation between 56Ni mass and host age in the local universe that is shallower and not as significant as that seen at higher redshifts. The details of the age -- 56Ni mass correlations at low and higher redshift imply a luminosity-weighted age threshhold of ~3 Gyr for SN Ia hosts, above which they are less likely to produce SNe Ia with 56Ni masses above ~0.5 M_sun. (Abridged)
The detection of Pop III supernovae could directly probe the primordial IMF for the first time, unveiling the properties of the first galaxies, early chemical enrichment and reionization, and the seeds of supermassive black holes. Growing evidence that some Pop III stars were less massive than 100 solar masses may complicate prospects for their detection, because even though they would have been more plentiful they would have died as core-collapse supernovae, with far less luminosity than pair-instability explosions. This picture greatly improves if the SN shock collides with a dense circumstellar shell ejected during a prior violent LBV type eruption. Such collisions can turn even dim SNe into extremely bright ones whose luminosities can rival those of pair-instability SNe. We present simulations of Pop III Type IIn SN light curves and spectra performed with the Los Alamos RAGE and SPECTRUM codes. Taking into account Lyman-alpha absorption in the early universe and cosmological redshifting, we find that 40 solar mass Pop III Type IIn SNe will be visible out to z ~ 20 with JWST and out to z ~ 7 with WFIRST. Thus, even low mass Pop III SNe can be used to probe the primeval universe.
While Type Ia Supernovae (SNe Ia) are one of the most mature cosmological probes, the next era promises to be extremely exciting in the number of different ways SNe Ia are used to measure various cosmological parameters. Here we review the experiments in the 2020s that will yield orders of magnitudes more SNe Ia, and the new understandings and capabilities to constrain systematic uncertainties at a level to match these statistics. We then discuss five different cosmological probes with SNe Ia: the conventional Hubble diagram for measuring dark energy properties, the distance ladder for measuring the Hubble constant, peculiar velocities and weak lensing for measuring sigma8 and strong-lens measurements of H0 and other cosmological parameters. For each of these probes, we discuss the experiments that will provide the best measurements and also the SN Ia-related systematics that affect each one.