2021-10-13

Current status and open issues in core-collapse supernova theory

speaker: Hiroki Nagakura

Abstract:

Core-collapse supernova (CCSN) explosion is a fiery death of massive stars. The explosion mechanism involves complex interplay between micro- and macroscopic physics, and numerical simulations have been used in efforts to uncover the roles of each physics. In this seminar, I give an overview of the progress with paying special attention to the results of our Princeton’s supernova group and Japanese one. In the former group, we revealed some common and progenitor dependent features of explosion dynamics and their observational consequences such as neutrino signals and gravitational waves; for the latter group, we have studied the detailed radiation-hydrodynamics features based on 2D/3D CCSN simulations with full Boltzmann neutrino transport that are also being in scientific running on “Fugaku”. Underlining the current status, I also discuss a key uncertainty in CCSN theory, that is collective neutrino oscillation. This potentially changes the energy spectrum and angular distribution of neutrinos, indicating that the fluid dynamics (including explosive dynamics), nucleosynthesis and neutrino signals would be substantially impacted. With presenting our recent results (collective neutrino oscillation ubiquitously occurs in CCSN environments), I discuss future prospects of developing the theory of CCSNe with quantum kinetic treatments of neutrinos, i.e., beyond full Boltzmann neutrino transport.