Binary neutron star merger in common envelope jet supernovae

TL;DR

This paper proposes a novel triple-star scenario where neutron stars in a binary system merge inside a red supergiant's envelope, producing luminous transients with potential gravitational wave signals and unique nucleosynthesis signatures.

Contribution

It introduces a new model of common envelope jets supernova involving NS-NS mergers inside RSGs, highlighting their potential observational signatures and nucleosynthesis contributions.

Findings

Event energy exceeds 10^{52} erg.

Light curve remains luminous for months to years.

Possible gravitational wave detection signals.

Abstract

I explore a triple-star scenario where a tight neutron star (NS) - NS binary system enters the envelope of a red supergiant (RSG) star and spirals-in towards its core. The two NSs accrete mass through accretion disks and launch jets that power a very luminous and long transient event, a common envelope jets supernova (CEJSN) event. Dynamical friction brings the two NSs to merge either in the RSG envelope or core. The total energy of the event, radiation and kinetic, is >10^{52}erg. The light curve stays luminous for months to years and a signal of gravitational waves might be detected. The ejecta contains freshly synthesized r-process elements not only from the NS-NS merger as in kilonova events, but possibly also from the pre-merger jets that the NSs launch inside the core, as in the r-process CEJSN scenario. This scenario shortens the time to NS-NS merger compared with that of kilonovae, and might somewhat ease the problem of the NS-NS r-process scenario to account for r-process nucleosynthesis in the early Universe. I estimate the ratio of NS-NS merger in CEJSN events to core collapse supernova (CCSN) events to be <10^{-6}-2x10^{-5}. However, because they are much more luminous I expect their detection fraction to that of CCSNe to be much larger than this number. This study calls for considering this and similar CEJSN scenarios in binary and in triple star systems when explaining peculiar and puzzling super luminous supernovae.