Letter to the Editor

The progenitor of SN 2023ixf from hydrodynamical modeling

¹ Instituto de Astrofísica de La Plata (IALP), CCT-CONICET-UNLP, Paseo del Bosque S/N, B1900FWA La Plata, Argentina
e-mail: mbersten@fcaglp.unlp.edu.ar
² Facultad de Ciencias Astronómicas y Geofísicas, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Paseo del Bosque S/N, 1900 La Plata, Buenos Aires, Argentina
³ Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (WPI), The University of Tokyo, 5-1-5 Kashiwanoha, Kashiwa, Chiba 277-8583, Japan
⁴ Universidad Nacional de Río Negro. Sede Andina, Laboratorio de Investigación Científica en Astronomía, Anasagasti 1463, Bariloche 8400, Argentina
⁵ Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Godoy Cruz 2290, 1425 Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires, Argentina

Received: 6 October 2023
Accepted: 27 December 2023

Abstract

Context. The supernova (SN) 2023ixf is among the nearest Type II SNe discovered in recent decades. As such, there is a wealth of observational data of both the event itself and of the associated object identified in pre-explosion images. This has enabled variety of studies aimed at determining the SN properties and the nature of the putative progenitor star. Modeling the light curve is a powerful method to derive the physical properties independently of direct progenitor analyses.

Aims. We investigate the physical nature of SN 2023ixf based on a hydrodynamical modeling of its bolometric light curve and expansion velocities during the complete photospheric phase.

Methods. A grid of one dimensional (1D) explosions was calculated for evolved stars of different masses. We derived the properties of SN 2023ixf and its progenitor by comparing our models with the observations.

Results. The observations at t ≳ 20 days are aptly reproduced by the explosion of a star with zero-age main sequence mass of M_ZAMS = 12 M_⊙, an explosion energy of 1.2 × 10⁵¹ erg, and a nickel mass of 0.05 M_⊙. This indicates that SN 2023ixf was a normal event. Our modeling suggests a limit of M_ZAMS < 15 M_⊙, thereby favouring the low-mass range among the results from pre-explosion observations.