ZTF-observed late-time signals of pre-ZTF transients

¹ School of Physics, Trinity College Dublin, The University of Dublin, Dublin 2, Ireland
² Nordic Optical Telescope, Rambla José Ana Fernández Pérez 7, ES-38711 Breña Baja, Spain
³ Oskar Klein Centre, Department of Astronomy, Stockholm University, Albanova University Center, SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
⁴ School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK
⁵ IPAC, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E. California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
⁶ Department Physics, Math, and Astronomy, California Institute of Technology, 1200 E. California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
⁷ Department of Physics, Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA

^⋆ Corresponding author: terwelj@tcd.ie

Received: 10 September 2024
Accepted: 19 March 2025

Abstract

With large-scale surveys such as the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), it has become possible to obtain a well-sampled light curve spanning the full length of the survey for any discovery within the survey footprint. Similarly, any transient within the footprint that was first detected before the start of the survey will likely have a large number of post-transient observations, making such transients excellent targets to search for the presence of late-time signals, particularly those due to interaction with circumstellar material (CSM). We searched for late-time signals in a sample of 7718 transients, mainly supernovae (SNe), that were first detected during the 10 years before the start of ZTF, aiming to find objects showing signs of late-time interaction with CSM. We found one candidate whose late-time signal is best explained by late-time CSM interaction, with the signal being around 300 days after transient discovery. A thin, distant shell containing ≲5 M_⊙ of material could explain the recovered signal. We also found five objects whose late-time signal is best explained by faint nuclear transients occurring in host nuclei close to the pre-ZTF transient locations. Finally, we found two objects where it is difficult to determine whether the signal is from a nuclear transient or due to late-time CSM interaction occurring over 5 years after the SN. This study demonstrates the ability of large-scale surveys to find faint transient signals for a variety of objects and uncover a population of previously unknown sources. However, the large number of non-detections shows that strong late-time CSM interaction occurring years after the SN explosion is extremely rare.