Multi-D Simulations of Ultra-Stripped Supernovae to Shock Breakout

The recent discoveries of many double neutron star systems and their detection as LIGO-Virgo merger events call for a detailed understanding of their origin. Explosions of ultra-stripped stars in binary systems have been shown to play a key role in this context and have also generated interest as a potential explanation for rapidly evolving hydrogen-free transients. Here we present the first attempt to model such explosions based on binary evolution calculations that follow the mass transfer to the companion to obtain a consistent core-envelope structure as needed for reliable predictions of the supernova transient. We simulate the explosion in 2D and 3D, and confirm the modest explosion energies ~10^50erg and small kick velocities reported earlier in 2D models based on bare carbon-oxygen cores. The spin-up of the neutron star by asymmetric accretion is small in 3D with no indication of spin-kick alignment. Simulations up to shock breakout show the mixing of sizeable amounts of iron group material into the helium envelope. In view of recent ideas for a mixing-length treatment (MLT) of Rayleigh-Taylor instabilities in supernovae, we perform a detailed analysis of the mixing, which reveals evidence for buoyancy-drag balance, but otherwise does not support the MLT approximation. The mixing may have implications for the spectroscopic signatures of ultra-stripped supernovae that need to be investigated in the future. Our stellar evolution calculation also predicts presupernova mass loss due to an off-centre silicon deflagration flash, which suggests that supernovae from extremely stripped cores may show signs of interactions with circumstellar material.
Comment: 15 pages, 15 figures, submitted to MNRAS