Blue supergiant progenitor models of type II supernovae

Astrophysical Institute, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels, Belgium
e-mail: dvbevere@vub.ac.be

Received: 9 January 2013
Accepted: 6 March 2013

Abstract

We show that within all the uncertainties that govern the process of Roche-lobe overflow in case Br-type massive binaries, it cannot be excluded that a significant fraction of them merge and become single stars. We demonstrate that at least some of them will spend most of their core helium-burning phase as hydrogen-rich blue stars, populating the massive blue supergiant region and/or the massive Be-type star population. The evolutionary simulations lead us to suspect that these mergers will explode as luminous blue hydrogen-rich stars, and it is tempting to link them to at least some superluminous supernovae.