Delayed Detonation Thermonuclear Supernovae With An Extended Dark Matter Component

TL;DR

This study simulates thermonuclear supernovae with an extended dark matter component, revealing impacts on explosion dynamics, light curves, and potential dark compact object formation, challenging supernovae's role as standard candles.

Contribution

It introduces a novel two-fluid simulation approach for supernovae with dark matter, showing dark matter's influence on explosion characteristics and remnant formation.

Findings

Dark matter lengthens deflagration phase and increases neutrino production.

Dark matter causes supernovae to have dimmer, broader light curves.

Remnants are dark matter-rich compact objects resembling sub-solar-mass black holes.

Abstract

We present simulations of thermonuclear supernovae admixed with an extended component of fermionic cold dark matter. We consider the explosion of a Chandrasekhar-mass white dwarf using the deflagration model with deflagration-detonation transition with spherical symmetry. The dark matter component is comparable in size with that of the normal matter, and so the system is described by two-fluid, one-dimensional Eulerian hydrodynamics. The explosion leaves all the dark matter trapped as a remnant compact dark star in all of our considered models. The presence of dark matter lengthens the deflagration phase to produce more thermo-neutrinos and similar amounts of iron-group elements compared to those of ordinary explosions with no dark matter admixture. The dark matter admixed models produce dimmer and broader light curves, which challenge the role of thermonuclear supernovae as standard candles in cosmic distance measurement. Our results also suggest a formation path of dark compact objects which mimic sub-solar-mass black holes as dark gravitational sources, through near-solar-mass dark matter admixed thermonuclear supernovae.