Accelerating Our Understanding of Supernova Explosion Mechanism via Simulations and Visualizations with GenASiS

TL;DR

This paper explores the role of instabilities in core-collapse supernovae using simulations and visualizations with the GenASiS code, aiming to improve understanding of these complex explosions.

Contribution

It introduces simulation and visualization results from GenASiS to study supernova instabilities, aiding interpretation of multi-physics models.

Findings

Insights into the role of instabilities in supernova explosions

Enhanced understanding of explosion mechanisms through visualizations

Support for simplified models in supernova research

Abstract

Core-collapse supernovae are among the most powerful explosions in the Universe, releasing about $10^{53}~\mbox{erg}$ of energy on timescales of a few tens of seconds. These explosion events are also responsible for the production and dissemination of most of the heavy elements, making life as we know it possible. Yet exactly how they work is still unresolved. One reason for this is the sheer complexity and cost of a self-consistent, multi-physics, and multi-dimensional core-collapse supernova simulation, which is impractical, and often impossible, even on the largest supercomputers we have available today. To advance our understanding we instead must often use simplified models, teasing out the most important ingredients for successful explosions, while helping us to interpret results from higher fidelity multi-physics models. In this paper we investigate the role of instabilities in the core-collapse supernova environment. We present here simulation and visualization results produced by our code GenASiS.