HST Images Flash Ionization of Old Ejecta by the 2011 Eruption of Recurrent Nova T Pyxidis

TL;DR

This study used Hubble Space Telescope images to observe flash ionization in the ejecta of recurrent nova T Pyxidis after its 2011 eruption, revealing dense hydrogen regions and constraining the nova's eruption history.

Contribution

First detailed temporal imaging of ionization and recombination in T Pyxidis ejecta, providing new insights into the density and mass of hydrogen and the nova's eruption timeline.

Findings

Detected delayed photoionization of hydrogen 132 days post-eruption.

Recombination of hydrogen occurred within 51 days after ionization.

Identified a large reservoir of cold, diffuse hydrogen exceeding previous estimates.

Abstract

T Pyxidis is the only recurrent nova surrounded by knots of material ejected in previous outbursts. Following the eruption that began on 2011 April 14.29, we obtained seven epochs (from 4 to 383 days after eruption) of Hubble Space Telescope narrowband Ha images of T Pyx . The flash of radiation from the nova event had no effect on the ejecta until at least 55 days after the eruption began. Photoionization of hydrogen located north and south of the central star was seen 132 days after the beginning of the eruption. That hydrogen recombined in the following 51 days, allowing us to determine a hydrogen atom density of at least 7e5 cm^-3 - at least an order of magnitude denser than the previously detected, unresolved [NII] knots surrounding T Pyx. Material to the northwest and southeast was photoionized between 132 and 183 days after the eruption began. 99 days later that hydrogen had recombined. Both then (282 days after outburst) and 101 days later, we detected almost no trace of hydrogen emission around T Pyx. There is a large reservoir of previously unseen, cold diffuse hydrogen overlapping the previously detected, [NII] - emitting knots of T Pyx ejecta. The mass of this newly detected hydrogen is probably an order of magnitude larger than that of the [NII] knots. We also determine that there is no significant reservoir of undetected ejecta from the outer boundaries of the previously detected ejecta out to about twice that distance, near the plane of the sky. The lack of distant ejecta is consistent with the Schaefer et al (2010) scenario for T Pyx, in which the star underwent its first eruption within five years of 1866 after many millennia of quiescence, followed by the six observed recurrent nova eruptions since 1890. This lack of distant ejecta is not consistent with scenarios in which T Pyx has been erupting continuously as a recurrent nova for many centuries or millennia.