Metallic hydrogen

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallic_hydrogen

Metallic hydrogen is a phase of hydrogen in which it behaves like an electrical conductor. This phase was predicted in 1935 on theoretical grounds by Eugene Wigner and Hillard Bell Huntington.

At high pressure and temperatures, metallic hydrogen can exist as a partial liquid rather than a solid, and researchers think it might be present in large quantities in the hot and gravitationally compressed interiors of Jupiter and Saturn, as well as in some exoplanets.

Theoretical predictions

A diagram of Jupiter showing a model of the planet's interior, with a rocky core overlaid by a deep layer of liquid metallic hydrogen (shown as magenta) and an outer layer predominantly of molecular hydrogen. Jupiter's true interior composition is uncertain. For instance, the core may have shrunk as convection currents of hot liquid metallic hydrogen mixed with the molten core and carried its contents to higher levels in the planetary interior. Furthermore, there is no clear physical boundary between the hydrogen layers—with increasing depth the gas increases smoothly in temperature and density, ultimately becoming liquid. Features are shown to scale except for the aurorae and the orbits of the Galilean moons.

Hydrogen under pressure

Though generally placed atop the alkali metal column in the periodic table, hydrogen does not, under ordinary conditions, exhibit the properties of an alkali metal. Instead, it forms diatomic H₂ molecules, similar to halogens and some nonmetals in the second period of the periodic table, such as nitrogen and oxygen. Diatomic hydrogen is a gas that, at atmospheric pressure, liquefies and solidifies only at very low temperature (20 K and 14 K respectively).

In 1935, physicists Eugene Wigner and Hillard Bell Huntington predicted that under an immense pressure of around 25 GPa (250,000 atm; 3,600,000 psi), hydrogen would display metallic properties: instead of discrete H₂ molecules (which consist of two electrons bound between two protons), a bulk phase would form with a solid lattice of protons and the electrons delocalized throughout. Since then, producing metallic hydrogen in the laboratory has been described as "the holy grail of high-pressure physics".

The initial prediction about the amount of pressure needed was eventually shown to be too low. Since the first work by Wigner and Huntington, the more modern theoretical calculations point toward higher but potentially achievable metallization pressures of around 400 GPa (3,900,000 atm; 58,000,000 psi).

Liquid metallic hydrogen

Helium-4 is a liquid at normal pressure near absolute zero, a consequence of its high zero-point energy (ZPE). The ZPE of protons in a dense state is also high, and a decline in the ordering energy (relative to the ZPE) is expected at high pressures. Arguments have been advanced by Neil Ashcroft and others that there is a melting point maximum in compressed hydrogen, but also that there might be a range of densities, at pressures around 400 GPa, where hydrogen would be a liquid metal, even at low temperatures.

Geng predicted that the ZPE of protons indeed lowers the melting temperature of hydrogen to a minimum of 200 to 250 K (−73 to −23 °C) at pressures of 500–1,500 GPa (4,900,000–14,800,000 atm; 73,000,000–218,000,000 psi).

Within this flat region there might be an elemental mesophase intermediate between the liquid and solid state, which could be metastably stabilized down to low temperature and enter a supersolid state.

Superconductivity

Main article: Superconductivity

Further information: Room-temperature superconductor

In 1968, Neil Ashcroft suggested that metallic hydrogen might be a superconductor, up to room temperature (290 K or 17 °C). This hypothesis is based on an expected strong coupling between conduction electrons and lattice vibrations.

As a rocket propellant

Metastable metallic hydrogen may have potential as a highly efficient rocket propellant; the metallic form would be stored, and the energy of its decompression and conversion to the diatomic gaseous form when released through a nozzle used to generate thrust, with a theoretical specific impulse of up to 1700 seconds (for reference, the current most efficient chemical rocket propellants have an I_sp less than 500 s), although a metastable form suitable for mass-production and conventional high-volume storage may not exist. Another significant issue is the heat of the reaction, which at over 6000 K is too high for any known engine materials to be used. This would necessitate diluting the metallic hydrogen with water or liquid hydrogen, a mixture that would still provide a significant performance boost over current propellants.

Possibility of novel types of quantum fluid

Presently known "super" states of matter are superconductors, superfluid liquids and gases, and supersolids. Egor Babaev predicted that if hydrogen and deuterium have liquid metallic states, they might have quantum ordered states that cannot be classified as superconducting or superfluid in the usual sense. Instead, they might represent two possible novel types of quantum fluids: superconducting superfluids and metallic superfluids. Such fluids were predicted to have highly unusual reactions to external magnetic fields and rotations, which might provide a means for experimental verification of Babaev's predictions. It has also been suggested that, under the influence of a magnetic field, hydrogen might exhibit phase transitions from superconductivity to superfluidity and vice versa.

Lithium alloying reduces requisite pressure

In 2009, Zurek et al. predicted that the alloy LiH₆ would be a stable metal at only one quarter of the pressure required to metallize hydrogen, and that similar effects should hold for alloys of type LiH_n and possibly "other alkali high-hydride systems", i.e. alloys of type XH_n, where X is an alkali metal. This was later verified in AcH₈ and LaH₁₀ with T_c approaching 270 K leading to speculation that other compounds may even be stable at mere MPa pressures with room-temperature superconductivity.

Experimental pursuit

Shock-wave compression, 1996

In March 1996, a group of scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory reported that they had serendipitously produced the first identifiably metallic hydrogen for about a microsecond at temperatures of thousands of kelvins, pressures of over 100 GPa (1,000,000 atm; 15,000,000 psi), and densities of approximately 0.6 g/cm³. The team did not expect to produce metallic hydrogen, as it was not using solid hydrogen, thought to be necessary, and was working at temperatures above those specified by metallization theory. Previous studies in which solid hydrogen was compressed inside diamond anvils to pressures of up to 250 GPa (2,500,000 atm; 37,000,000 psi), did not confirm detectable metallization. The team had sought simply to measure the less extreme electrical conductivity changes they expected. The researchers used a 1960s-era light-gas gun, originally employed in guided missile studies, to shoot an impactor plate into a sealed container containing a half-millimeter thick sample of liquid hydrogen. The liquid hydrogen was in contact with wires leading to a device measuring electrical resistance. The scientists found that, as pressure rose to 140 GPa (1,400,000 atm; 21,000,000 psi), the electronic energy band gap, a measure of electrical resistance, fell to almost zero. The band gap of hydrogen in its uncompressed state is about 15 eV, making it an insulator but, as the pressure increases significantly, the band gap gradually fell to 0.3 eV. Because the thermal energy of the fluid (the temperature became about 3,000 K or 2,730 °C due to compression of the sample) was above 0.3 eV, the hydrogen might be considered metallic.

Other experimental research, 1996–2004

Many experiments are continuing in the production of metallic hydrogen in laboratory conditions at static compression and low temperature. Arthur Ruoff and Chandrabhas Narayana from Cornell University in 1998, and later Paul Loubeyre and René LeToullec from Commissariat à l'Énergie Atomique, France in 2002, have shown that at pressures close to those at the center of the Earth (320–340 GPa or 3,200,000–3,400,000 atm) and temperatures of 100–300 K (−173–27 °C), hydrogen is still not a true alkali metal, because of the non-zero band gap. The quest to see metallic hydrogen in laboratory at low temperature and static compression continues. Studies are also ongoing on deuterium. Shahriar Badiei and Leif Holmlid from the University of Gothenburg have shown in 2004 that condensed metallic states made of excited hydrogen atoms (Rydberg matter) are effective promoters to metallic hydrogen, however these results are disputed.

Pulsed laser heating experiment, 2008

The theoretically predicted maximum of the melting curve (the prerequisite for the liquid metallic hydrogen) was discovered by Shanti Deemyad and Isaac F. Silvera by using pulsed laser heating. Hydrogen-rich molecular silane (SiH₄) was claimed to be metallized and become superconducting by M.I. Eremets et al.. This claim is disputed, and their results have not been repeated.

Observation of liquid metallic hydrogen, 2011

In 2011 Eremets and Troyan reported observing the liquid metallic state of hydrogen and deuterium at static pressures of 260–300 GPa (2,600,000–3,000,000 atm). This claim was questioned by other researchers in 2012.

Z machine, 2015

In 2015, scientists at the Z Pulsed Power Facility announced the creation of metallic deuterium using dense liquid deuterium, an electrical insulator-to-conductor transition associated with an increase in optical reflectivity.

Claimed observation of solid metallic hydrogen, 2016

On 5 October 2016, Ranga Dias and Isaac F. Silvera of Harvard University released claims in a pre-print manuscript of experimental evidence that solid metallic hydrogen had been synthesized in the laboratory at a pressure of around 495 gigapascals (4,890,000 atm; 71,800,000 psi) using a diamond anvil cell. A revised version was published in Science in 2017.

In the preprint version of the paper, Dias and Silvera write:

With increasing pressure we observe changes in the sample, going from transparent, to black, to a reflective metal, the latter studied at a pressure of 495 GPa... the reflectance using a Drude free electron model to determine the plasma frequency of 30.1 eV at T = 5.5 K, with a corresponding electron carrier density of 6.7×10²³ particles/cm³, consistent with theoretical estimates. The properties are those of a metal. Solid metallic hydrogen has been produced in the laboratory.

— Dias & Silvera (2016)

In June 2019 a team at the Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (French Alternative Energies & Atomic Energy Commission) claimed to have created metallic hydrogen at around 425GPa.

W. Ferreira et al. (including Dias and Silvera) repeated their experiments multiple times after the Science article was published, finally publishing in 2023 and finding metallisation of hydrogen between 477 and 491 gigapascals (4,710,000 and 4,850,000 atm). This time, the pressure was released to assess the question of metastability. Metallic hydrogen was not found to be metastable to zero pressure.

Experiments on fluid deuterium at the National Ignition Facility, 2018

In August 2018, scientists announced new observations regarding the rapid transformation of fluid deuterium from an insulating to a metallic form below 2000 K. Remarkable agreement is found between the experimental data and the predictions based on quantum Monte Carlo simulations, which is expected to be the most accurate method to date. This may help researchers better understand giant gas planets, such as Jupiter, Saturn and related exoplanets, since such planets are thought to contain a lot of liquid metallic hydrogen, which may be responsible for their observed powerful magnetic fields.

Degenerate matter

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Degenerate_matter

Degenerate matter occurs when the Pauli exclusion principle significantly alters a state of matter at low temperature. The term is used in astrophysics to refer to dense stellar objects such as white dwarfs and neutron stars, where thermal pressure alone is not enough to prevent gravitational collapse. The term also applies to metals in the Fermi gas approximation.

Degenerate matter is usually modelled as an ideal Fermi gas, an ensemble of non-interacting fermions. In a quantum mechanical description, particles limited to a finite volume may take only a discrete set of energies, called quantum states. The Pauli exclusion principle prevents identical fermions from occupying the same quantum state. At lowest total energy (when the thermal energy of the particles is negligible), all the lowest energy quantum states are filled. This state is referred to as full degeneracy. This degeneracy pressure remains non-zero even at absolute zero temperature. Adding particles or reducing the volume forces the particles into higher-energy quantum states. In this situation, a compression force is required, and is made manifest as a resisting pressure. The key feature is that this degeneracy pressure does not depend on the temperature but only on the density of the fermions. Degeneracy pressure keeps dense stars in equilibrium, independent of the thermal structure of the star.

A degenerate mass whose fermions have velocities close to the speed of light (particle kinetic energy larger than its rest mass energy) is called relativistic degenerate matter. The concept of degenerate stars, stellar objects composed of degenerate matter, was originally developed in a joint effort between Arthur Eddington, Ralph Fowler and Arthur Milne.

Concept

Main article: Fermi-Dirac statistics

Quantum mechanics uses the word 'degenerate' in two ways: degenerate energy levels and as the low temperature ground state limit for states of matter. The electron degeneracy pressure occurs in the ground state systems which are non-degenerate in energy levels. The term "degeneracy" derives from work on the specific heat of gases that pre-dates the use of the term in quantum mechanics.

Degenerate matter exhibits quantum mechanical properties when a fermion system temperature approaches absolute zero. These properties result from a combination of the Pauli exclusion principle and quantum confinement. The Pauli principle allows only one fermion in each quantum state and the confinement ensures that energy of these states increases as they are filled. The lowest states fill up and fermions are forced to occupy high energy states even at low temperature.

While the Pauli principle and Fermi-Dirac distribution applies to all matter, the interesting cases for degenerate matter involve systems of many fermions. These cases can be understood with the help of the Fermi gas model. Examples include electrons in metals and in white dwarf stars and neutrons in neutron stars. The electrons are confined by Coulomb attraction to positive ion cores; the neutrons are confined by gravitation attraction. The fermions, forced in to higher levels by the Pauli principle, exert pressure preventing further compression.

The allocation or distribution of fermions into quantum states ranked by energy is called the Fermi-Dirac distribution. Degenerate matter exhibits the results of Fermi-Dirac distribution.

Degeneracy pressure

Unlike a classical ideal gas, whose pressure is proportional to its temperature $${\displaystyle P=k_{\mathrm{B}}\frac{NT}{V},}$$ where P is pressure, k_B is the Boltzmann constant, N is the number of particles (typically atoms or molecules), T is temperature, and V is the volume, the pressure exerted by degenerate matter depends only weakly on its temperature. In particular, the pressure remains nonzero even at absolute zero temperature. At relatively low densities, the pressure of a fully degenerate gas can be derived by treating the system as an ideal Fermi gas, in this way $${\displaystyle P=\frac{(3{\pi }^2{)}^{2/3}{\hslash }^2}{5m}{\left(\frac{N}{V}\right)}^{5/3},}$$ where m is the mass of the individual particles making up the gas. At very high densities, where most of the particles are forced into quantum states with relativistic energies, the pressure is given by $${\displaystyle P=K{\left(\frac{N}{V}\right)}^{4/3},}$$ where K is another proportionality constant depending on the properties of the particles making up the gas.

Pressure vs temperature curves of a classical ideal gas and quantum ideal gases (Fermi gas, Bose gas), for a given particle density.

All matter experiences both normal thermal pressure and degeneracy pressure, but in commonly encountered gases, thermal pressure dominates so much that degeneracy pressure can be ignored. Likewise, degenerate matter still has normal thermal pressure; the degeneracy pressure dominates to the point that temperature has a negligible effect on the total pressure. The adjacent figure shows the thermal pressure (red line) and total pressure (blue line) in a Fermi gas, with the difference between the two being the degeneracy pressure. As the temperature falls, the density and the degeneracy pressure increase, until the degeneracy pressure contributes most of the total pressure.

While degeneracy pressure usually dominates at extremely high densities, it is the ratio between degenerate pressure and thermal pressure which determines degeneracy. Given a sufficiently drastic increase in temperature (such as during a red giant star's helium flash), matter can become non-degenerate without reducing its density.

Degeneracy pressure contributes to the pressure of conventional solids, but these are not usually considered to be degenerate matter because a significant contribution to their pressure is provided by electrical repulsion of atomic nuclei and the screening of nuclei from each other by electrons. The free electron model of metals derives their physical properties by considering the conduction electrons alone as a degenerate gas, while the majority of the electrons are regarded as occupying bound quantum states. This solid state contrasts with degenerate matter that forms the body of a white dwarf, where most of the electrons would be treated as occupying free particle momentum states.

Exotic examples of degenerate matter include neutron degenerate matter, strange matter, metallic hydrogen and white dwarf matter.

Degenerate gases

Degenerate gases are gases composed of fermions such as electrons, protons, and neutrons rather than molecules of ordinary matter. The electron gas in ordinary metals and in the interior of white dwarfs are two examples. Following the Pauli exclusion principle, there can be only one fermion occupying each quantum state. In a degenerate gas, all quantum states are filled up to the Fermi energy. Most stars are supported against their own gravitation by normal thermal gas pressure, while in white dwarf stars the supporting force comes from the degeneracy pressure of the electron gas in their interior. In neutron stars, the degenerate particles are neutrons.

A fermion gas in which all quantum states below a given energy level are filled is called a fully degenerate fermion gas. The difference between this energy level and the lowest energy level is known as the Fermi energy.

Electron degeneracy

Main articles: Electron degeneracy pressure and White dwarf

In an ordinary fermion gas in which thermal effects dominate, most of the available electron energy levels are unfilled and the electrons are free to move to these states. As particle density is increased, electrons progressively fill the lower energy states and additional electrons are forced to occupy states of higher energy even at low temperatures. Degenerate gases strongly resist further compression because the electrons cannot move to already filled lower energy levels due to the Pauli exclusion principle. Since electrons cannot give up energy by moving to lower energy states, no thermal energy can be extracted. The momentum of the fermions in the fermion gas nevertheless generates pressure, termed "degeneracy pressure".

Under high densities, matter becomes a degenerate gas when all electrons are stripped from their parent atoms. The core of a star, once hydrogen burning nuclear fusion reactions stops, becomes a collection of positively charged ions, largely helium and carbon nuclei, floating in a sea of electrons, which have been stripped from the nuclei. Degenerate gas is an almost perfect conductor of heat and does not obey ordinary gas laws. White dwarfs are luminous not because they are generating energy but rather because they have trapped a large amount of heat which is gradually radiated away. Normal gas exerts higher pressure when it is heated and expands, but the pressure in a degenerate gas does not depend on the temperature. When gas becomes super-compressed, particles position right up against each other to produce degenerate gas that behaves more like a solid. In degenerate gases the kinetic energies of electrons are quite high and the rate of collision between electrons and other particles is quite low, therefore degenerate electrons can travel great distances at velocities that approach the speed of light. Instead of temperature, the pressure in a degenerate gas depends only on the speed of the degenerate particles; however, adding heat does not increase the speed of most of the electrons, because they are stuck in fully occupied quantum states. Pressure is increased only by the mass of the particles, which increases the gravitational force pulling the particles closer together. Therefore, the phenomenon is the opposite of that normally found in matter where if the mass of the matter is increased, the object becomes bigger. In degenerate gas, when the mass is increased, the particles become spaced closer together due to gravity (and the pressure is increased), so the object becomes smaller. Degenerate gas can be compressed to very high densities, typical values being in the range of 10,000 kilograms per cubic centimeter.

There is an upper limit to the mass of an electron-degenerate object, the Chandrasekhar limit, beyond which electron degeneracy pressure cannot support the object against collapse. The limit is approximately 1.44 solar masses for objects with typical compositions expected for white dwarf stars (carbon and oxygen with two baryons per electron). This mass cut-off is appropriate only for a star supported by ideal electron degeneracy pressure under Newtonian gravity; in general relativity and with realistic Coulomb corrections, the corresponding mass limit is around 1.38 solar masses. The limit may also change with the chemical composition of the object, as it affects the ratio of mass to number of electrons present. The object's rotation, which counteracts the gravitational force, also changes the limit for any particular object. Celestial objects below this limit are white dwarf stars, formed by the gradual shrinking of the cores of stars that run out of fuel. During this shrinking, an electron-degenerate gas forms in the core, providing sufficient degeneracy pressure as it is compressed to resist further collapse. Above this mass limit, a neutron star (primarily supported by neutron degeneracy pressure) or a black hole may be formed instead.

Neutron degeneracy

Main article: Neutron star

Neutron degeneracy is analogous to electron degeneracy and exists in neutron stars, which are partially supported by the pressure from a degenerate neutron gas. Neutron stars are formed either directly from the supernova of stars with masses between 10 and 25 M_☉ (solar masses), or by white dwarfs acquiring a mass in excess of the Chandrasekhar limit of 1.44 M_☉, usually either as a result of a merger or by feeding off of a close binary partner. Above the Chandrasekhar limit, the gravitational pressure at the core exceeds the electron degeneracy pressure, and electrons begin to combine with protons to produce neutrons (via inverse beta decay, also termed electron capture). The result is an extremely compact star composed of "nuclear matter", which is predominantly a degenerate neutron gas with a small admixture of degenerate proton and electron gases.

Neutrons in a degenerate neutron gas are spaced much more closely than electrons in an electron-degenerate gas because the more massive neutron has a much shorter wavelength at a given energy. This phenomenon is compounded by the fact that the pressures within neutron stars are much higher than those in white dwarfs. The pressure increase is caused by the fact that the compactness of a neutron star causes gravitational forces to be much higher than in a less compact body with similar mass. The result is a star with a diameter on the order of a thousandth that of a white dwarf.

The properties of neutron matter set an upper limit to the mass of a neutron star, the Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit, which is analogous to the Chandrasekhar limit for white dwarf stars.

Proton degeneracy

Sufficiently dense matter containing protons experiences proton degeneracy pressure, in a manner similar to the electron degeneracy pressure in electron-degenerate matter: protons confined to a sufficiently small volume have a large uncertainty in their momentum due to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. However, because protons are much more massive than electrons, the same momentum represents a much smaller velocity for protons than for electrons. As a result, in matter with approximately equal numbers of protons and electrons, proton degeneracy pressure is much smaller than electron degeneracy pressure, and proton degeneracy is usually modelled as a correction to the equations of state of electron-degenerate matter.

Quark degeneracy

Main articles: Quark star and Strange star

At densities greater than those supported by neutron degeneracy, quark-degenerate matter may occur in the cores of neutron stars, depending on the equations of state of neutron-degenerate matter. There is no observational evidence to support this conjecture and theoretical models that predict de-confined quark matter are only valid at masses higher than any observed neutron star.

History

In 1914 Walther Nernst described the reduction of the specific heat of gases at very low temperature as "degeneration"; he attributed this to quantum effects. In subsequent work in various papers on quantum thermodynamics by Albert Einstein, by Max Planck, and by Erwin Schrödinger, the effect at low temperatures came to be called "gas degeneracy". A fully degenerate gas has no volume dependence on pressure when temperature approaches absolute zero.

Early in 1927 Enrico Fermi and separately Llewellyn Thomas developed a semi-classical model for electrons in a metal. The model treated the electrons as a gas. Later in 1927, Arnold Sommerfeld applied the Pauli principle via Fermi-Dirac statistics to this electron gas model, computing the specific heat of metals; the result became Fermi gas model for metals. Sommerfeld called the low temperature region with quantum effects a "wholly degenerate gas".

The concept of degenerate stars, stellar objects composed of degenerate matter, was originally developed in a joint effort between Arthur Eddington, Ralph Fowler and Arthur Milne. Eddington had suggested that the atoms in Sirius B were almost completely ionised and closely packed. Fowler described white dwarfs as composed of a gas of particles that became degenerate at low temperature; he also pointed out that ordinary atoms are broadly similar in regards to the filling of energy levels by fermions. In 1926, Milne proposed that degenerate matter is found in the cores of ordinary stars, not only in compact stars. In 1927 Ralph H. Fowler applied Fermi's model to the puzzle of the stability of white dwarf stars. This approach was extended to relativistic models by later studies and with the work of Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar became the accepted model for star stability.

Helium flash

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium_flash

Fusion of helium in the core of low-mass stars.

A helium flash is a very brief thermal runaway nuclear fusion of large quantities of helium into carbon through the triple-alpha process in the core of low-mass stars (between 0.5-0.44 solar masses (M_☉) and 2.0 M_☉) during their red giant phase. The Sun is predicted to experience a flash 1.2 billion years after it leaves the main sequence. A much rarer runaway helium fusion process can also occur on the surface of accreting white dwarf stars.

Low-mass stars do not produce enough gravitational pressure to initiate normal helium fusion. As the hydrogen in the core is exhausted, some of the helium left behind is instead compacted into degenerate matter, supported against gravitational collapse by quantum mechanical pressure rather than thermal pressure. Subsequent hydrogen shell fusion further increases the mass of the core until it reaches temperature of approximately 100 million kelvin, which is hot enough to initiate helium fusion (or "helium burning") in the core.

However, a property of degenerate matter is that increases in temperature do not produce an increase in the pressure of the matter until the thermal pressure becomes so very high that it exceeds degeneracy pressure. In main sequence stars, thermal expansion regulates the core temperature, but in degenerate cores, this does not occur. Helium fusion increases the temperature, which increases the fusion rate, which further increases the temperature in a runaway reaction which quickly spans the entire core. This produces a flash of very intense helium fusion that lasts only a few minutes, but during that time, produces energy at a rate comparable to the entire Milky Way galaxy.

In the case of normal low-mass stars, the vast energy release causes much of the core to come out of degeneracy, allowing it to thermally expand. This consumes most of the total energy released by the helium flash, and any left-over energy is absorbed into the star's upper layers. Thus the helium flash is mostly undetectable by observation, and is described solely by astrophysical models. After the core's expansion and cooling, the star's surface rapidly cools and contracts in as little as 10,000 years until it is roughly 2% of its former radius and luminosity. It is estimated that the electron-degenerate helium core weighs about 40% of the star mass and that 6% of the core is converted into carbon.

Subflashes

Subflashes are pulsational instabilities that occur after the main helium flash. They are driven by stars that do not have good convective or radiative boundaries. Subflashes can last several hours to days and can occur for many years with each subsequent flash generally being weaker. Subflashes can be detected by applying fourier transforms to the light curve data.

Red giants

Sakurai's Object is a white dwarf undergoing a helium shell flash.

During the red giant phase of stellar evolution in stars with less than 2.0 M_☉, the nuclear fusion of hydrogen ceases in the core as it is depleted, leaving a helium-rich core. While fusion of hydrogen continues in the star's shell causing a continuation of the accumulation of helium in the core, making the core denser, the temperature is still unable to reach the level required for helium fusion, as happens in more massive stars. Thus the thermal pressure from fusion is no longer sufficient to counter the gravitational collapse and create the hydrostatic equilibrium found in most stars. This causes the star to start contracting and increasing in temperature until it eventually becomes compressed enough for the helium core to become degenerate matter. This degeneracy pressure is finally sufficient to stop further collapse of the most central material but the rest of the core continues to contract and the temperature continues to rise until it reaches a point (≈1×10⁸ K) at which the helium can ignite and start to fuse.

The explosive nature of the helium flash arises from its taking place in degenerate matter. Once the temperature reaches 100 million–200 million kelvin and helium fusion begins using the triple-alpha process, the temperature rapidly increases, further raising the helium fusion rate and, because degenerate matter is a good conductor of heat, widening the reaction region.

However, since degeneracy pressure (which is purely a function of density) is dominating thermal pressure (proportional to the product of density and temperature), the total pressure is only weakly dependent on temperature. Thus, the dramatic increase in temperature only causes a slight increase in pressure, so there is no stabilizing cooling expansion of the core.

This runaway reaction quickly climbs to about 100 billion times the star's normal energy production (for a few seconds) until the temperature increases to the point that thermal pressure again becomes dominant, eliminating the degeneracy. The core can then expand and cool down and a stable burning of helium will continue.

A star with mass greater than about 2.25 M_☉ starts to burn helium without its core becoming degenerate, and so does not exhibit this type of helium flash. In a very low-mass star (less than about 0.5 M_☉), the core is never hot enough to ignite helium. The degenerate helium core will keep on contracting, and finally becomes a helium white dwarf.

The helium flash is not directly observable on the surface by electromagnetic radiation. The flash occurs in the core deep inside the star, and the net effect will be that all released energy is absorbed by the entire core, causing the degenerate state to become nondegenerate. Earlier computations indicated that a nondisruptive mass loss would be possible in some cases, but later star modeling taking neutrino energy loss into account indicates no such mass loss.

In a one solar mass star, the helium flash is estimated to release about 5×10⁴¹ J, or about 0.3% of the energy release of a 1.5×10⁴⁴ J type Ia supernova, which is triggered by an analogous ignition of carbon fusion in a carbon–oxygen white dwarf.

Binary white dwarfs

When hydrogen gas is accreted onto a white dwarf from a binary companion star, the hydrogen can fuse to form helium for a narrow range of accretion rates, but most systems develop a layer of hydrogen over the degenerate white dwarf interior. This hydrogen can build up to form a shell near the surface of the star. When the mass of hydrogen becomes sufficiently large, runaway fusion causes a nova. In a few binary systems where the hydrogen fuses on the surface, the mass of helium built up can burn in an unstable helium flash. In certain binary systems the companion star may have lost most of its hydrogen and donate helium-rich material to the compact star. Note that similar flashes occur on neutron stars.

Helium shell flash

Helium shell flashes are a somewhat analogous but much less violent, nonrunaway helium ignition event, taking place in the absence of degenerate matter. They occur periodically in asymptotic giant branch stars in a shell outside the core. This is late in the life of a star in its giant phase. The star has burnt most of the helium available in the core, which is now composed of carbon and oxygen. Helium fusion continues in a thin shell around this core, but then turns off as helium becomes depleted. This allows hydrogen fusion to start in a layer above the helium layer. After enough additional helium accumulates, helium fusion is reignited, leading to a thermal pulse which eventually causes the star to expand and brighten temporarily (the pulse in luminosity is delayed because it takes a number of years for the energy from restarted helium fusion to reach the surface). Such pulses may last a few hundred years, and are thought to occur periodically every 10,000 to 100,000 years. After the flash, helium fusion continues at an exponentially decaying rate for about 40% of the cycle as the helium shell is consumed. Thermal pulses may cause a star to shed circumstellar shells of gas and dust.

Type Ia supernova

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_Ia_supernova

A Type Ia supernova (read: "type one-A") is a type of supernova that occurs in binary systems (two stars orbiting one another) in which one of the stars is a white dwarf. The other star can be anything from a giant star to an even smaller white dwarf.

Physically, carbon–oxygen white dwarfs with a low rate of rotation are limited to below 1.44 solar masses (M_☉). Beyond this "critical mass", they reignite and in some cases trigger a supernova explosion; this critical mass is often referred to as the Chandrasekhar mass, but is marginally different from the absolute Chandrasekhar limit, where electron degeneracy pressure is unable to prevent catastrophic collapse. If a white dwarf gradually accretes mass from a binary companion, or merges with a second white dwarf, the general hypothesis is that a white dwarf's core will reach the ignition temperature for carbon fusion as it approaches the Chandrasekhar mass. Within a few seconds of initiation of nuclear fusion, a substantial fraction of the matter in the white dwarf undergoes a runaway reaction, releasing enough energy (1×10⁴⁴ J) to unbind the star in a supernova explosion.

The Type Ia category of supernova produces a fairly consistent peak luminosity because of the fixed critical mass at which a white dwarf will explode. Their consistent peak luminosity allows these explosions to be used as standard candles to measure the distance to their host galaxies: the visual magnitude of a type Ia supernova, as observed from Earth, indicates its distance from Earth.

Consensus model

Spectrum of SN 1998aq, a type Ia supernova, one day after maximum light in the B band

The Type Ia supernova is a subcategory in the Minkowski–Zwicky supernova classification scheme, which was devised by German-American astronomer Rudolph Minkowski and Swiss astronomer Fritz Zwicky. There are several means by which a supernova of this type can form, but they share a common underlying mechanism. Theoretical astronomers long believed the progenitor star for this type of supernova is a white dwarf, and empirical evidence for this was found in 2014 when a Type Ia supernova was observed in the galaxy Messier 82. When a slowly-rotating carbon–oxygen white dwarf accretes matter from a companion, it can exceed the Chandrasekhar limit of about 1.44 M_☉, beyond which it can no longer support its weight with electron degeneracy pressure. In the absence of a countervailing process, the white dwarf would collapse to form a neutron star, in an accretion-induced non-ejective process, as normally occurs in the case of a white dwarf that is primarily composed of magnesium, neon, and oxygen.

The current view among astronomers who model Type Ia supernova explosions, however, is that this limit is never actually attained and collapse is never initiated. Instead, the increase in pressure and density due to the increasing weight raises the temperature of the core, and as the white dwarf approaches about 99% of the limit, a period of convection ensues, lasting approximately 1,000 years. At some point in this simmering phase, a deflagration flame front is born, powered by carbon fusion. The details of the ignition are still unknown, including the location and number of points where the flame begins. Oxygen fusion is initiated shortly thereafter, but this fuel is not consumed as completely as carbon.

G299 Type Ia supernova remnant.

Once fusion begins, the temperature of the white dwarf increases. A main sequence star supported by thermal pressure can expand and cool which automatically regulates the increase in thermal energy. However, degeneracy pressure is independent of temperature; white dwarfs are unable to regulate temperature in the manner of normal stars, so they are vulnerable to runaway fusion reactions. The flare accelerates dramatically, in part due to the Rayleigh–Taylor instability and interactions with turbulence. It is still a matter of considerable debate whether this flare transforms into a supersonic detonation from a subsonic deflagration.

Regardless of the exact details of how the supernova ignites, it is generally accepted that a substantial fraction of the carbon and oxygen in the white dwarf fuses into heavier elements within a period of only a few seconds, with the accompanying release of energy increasing the internal temperature to billions of degrees. The energy released (1–2×10⁴⁴ J) is more than sufficient to unbind the star; that is, the individual particles making up the white dwarf gain enough kinetic energy to fly apart from each other. The star explodes violently and releases a shock wave in which matter is typically ejected at speeds on the order of 5,000–20,000 km/s, roughly 6% of the speed of light. The energy released in the explosion also causes an extreme increase in luminosity. The typical visual absolute magnitude of Type Ia supernovae is M_v = −19.3 (about 5 billion times brighter than the Sun), with little variation. The Type Ia supernova leaves no compact remnant, but the whole mass of the former white dwarf dissipates through space.

The theory of this type of supernova is similar to that of novae, in which a white dwarf accretes matter more slowly and does not approach the Chandrasekhar limit. In the case of a nova, the infalling matter causes a hydrogen fusion surface explosion that does not disrupt the star.

Type Ia supernovae differ from Type II supernovae, which are caused by the cataclysmic explosion of the outer layers of a massive star as its core collapses, powered by release of gravitational potential energy via neutrino emission.

Formation

Formation process

 

An accretion disc forms around a compact body (such as a white dwarf) stripping gas from a companion giant star. NASA image

 

Supercomputer simulation of the explosion phase of the deflagration-to-detonation model of supernova formation.

Single degenerate progenitors

One model for the formation of this category of supernova is a close binary star system. The progenitor binary system consists of main sequence stars, with the primary possessing more mass than the secondary. Being greater in mass, the primary is the first of the pair to evolve onto the asymptotic giant branch, where the star's envelope expands considerably. If the two stars share a common envelope then the system can lose significant amounts of mass, reducing the angular momentum, orbital radius and period. After the primary has degenerated into a white dwarf, the secondary star later evolves into a red giant and the stage is set for mass accretion onto the primary. During this final shared-envelope phase, the two stars spiral in closer together as angular momentum is lost. The resulting orbit can have a period as brief as a few hours. If the accretion continues long enough, the white dwarf may eventually approach the Chandrasekhar limit.

The white dwarf companion could also accrete matter from other types of companions, including a subgiant or (if the orbit is sufficiently close) even a main sequence star. The actual evolutionary process during this accretion stage remains uncertain, as it can depend both on the rate of accretion and the transfer of angular momentum to the white dwarf companion.

It has been estimated that single degenerate progenitors account for no more than 20% of all Type Ia supernovae.

Double degenerate progenitors

A second possible mechanism for triggering a Type Ia supernova is the merger of two white dwarfs whose combined mass exceeds the Chandrasekhar limit. The resulting merger is called a super-Chandrasekhar mass white dwarf. In such a case, the total mass would not be constrained by the Chandrasekhar limit.

Collisions of solitary stars within the Milky Way occur only once every 10⁷ to 10¹³ years; far less frequently than the appearance of novae. Collisions occur with greater frequency in the dense core regions of globular clusters (cf. blue stragglers). A likely scenario is a collision with a binary star system, or between two binary systems containing white dwarfs. This collision can leave behind a close binary system of two white dwarfs. Their orbit decays and they merge through their shared envelope. A study based on SDSS spectra found 15 double systems of the 4,000 white dwarfs tested, implying a double white dwarf merger every 100 years in the Milky Way: this rate matches the number of Type Ia supernovae detected in our neighborhood.

A double degenerate scenario is one of several explanations proposed for the anomalously massive (2 M_☉) progenitor of SN 2003fg. It is the only possible explanation for SNR 0509-67.5, as all possible models with only one white dwarf have been ruled out. It has also been strongly suggested for SN 1006, given that no companion star remnant has been found there.^[22] Observations made with NASA's Swift space telescope ruled out existing supergiant or giant companion stars of every Type Ia supernova studied. The supergiant companion's blown out outer shell should emit X-rays, but this glow was not detected by Swift's XRT (X-ray telescope) in the 53 closest supernova remnants. For 12 Type Ia supernovae observed within 10 days of the explosion, the satellite's UVOT (ultraviolet/optical telescope) showed no ultraviolet radiation originating from the heated companion star's surface hit by the supernova shock wave, meaning there were no red giants or larger stars orbiting those supernova progenitors. In the case of SN 2011fe, the companion star must have been smaller than the Sun, if it existed. The Chandra X-ray Observatory revealed that the X-ray radiation of five elliptical galaxies and the bulge of the Andromeda Galaxy is 30–50 times fainter than expected. X-ray radiation should be emitted by the accretion discs of Type Ia supernova progenitors. The missing radiation indicates that few white dwarfs possess accretion discs, ruling out the common, accretion-based model of Ia supernovae. Inward spiraling white dwarf pairs are strongly-inferred candidate sources of gravitational waves, although they have not been directly observed.

Type Iax

Main article: Type Iax supernova

It has been proposed that a group of sub-luminous supernovae should be classified as Type Iax. This type of supernova may not always completely destroy the white dwarf progenitor, but instead leave behind a zombie star. Known examples of type Iax supernovae include: the historical supernova SN 1181, SN 1991bg, SN 2002cx, and SN 2012Z.

The supernova SN 1181 is believed to be associated with the supernova remnant Pa 30 and its central star IRAS 00500+6713, which is the result of a merger of a CO white dwarf and an ONe white dwarf. This makes Pa 30 and IRAS 00500+6713 the only SN Iax remnant in the Milky Way.

Observation

Supernova remnant N103B taken by the Hubble Space Telescope.

Unlike the other types of supernovae, Type Ia supernovae generally occur in all types of galaxies, including ellipticals. They show no preference for regions of current stellar formation. As white dwarf stars form at the end of a star's main sequence evolutionary period, such a long-lived star system may have wandered far from the region where it originally formed. Thereafter a close binary system may spend another million years in the mass transfer stage (possibly forming persistent nova outbursts) before the conditions are ripe for a Type Ia supernova to occur.

A long-standing problem in astronomy has been the identification of supernova progenitors. Direct observation of a progenitor would provide useful constraints on supernova models. As of 2006, the search for such a progenitor had been ongoing for longer than a century. Observation of the supernova SN 2011fe has provided useful constraints. Previous observations with the Hubble Space Telescope did not show a star at the position of the event, thereby excluding a red giant as the source. The expanding plasma from the explosion was found to contain carbon and oxygen, making it likely the progenitor was a white dwarf primarily composed of these elements. Similarly, observations of the nearby SN PTF 11kx, discovered January 16, 2011 (UT) by the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF), lead to the conclusion that this explosion arises from single-degenerate progenitor, with a red giant companion, thus suggesting there is no single progenitor path to SN Ia. Direct observations of the progenitor of PTF 11kx were reported in the August 24 edition of Science and support this conclusion, and also show that the progenitor star experienced periodic nova eruptions before the supernova – another surprising discovery.  However, later analysis revealed that the circumstellar material is too massive for the single-degenerate scenario, and fits better the core-degenerate scenario.

In May 2015, NASA reported that the Kepler space observatory observed KSN 2011b, a Type Ia supernova in the process of exploding. Details of the pre-nova moments may help scientists better judge the quality of Type Ia supernovae as standard candles, which is an important link in the argument for dark energy.

In July 2019, the Hubble Space Telescope took three images of a Type Ia supernova through a gravitational lens. This supernova appeared at three different times in the evolution of its brightness due to the differing path length of the light in the three images; at −24, 92, and 107 days from peak luminosity. A fourth image will appear in 2037 allowing observation of the entire luminosity cycle of the supernova.

Light curve

This plot of luminosity (relative to the Sun, L₀) versus time shows the characteristic light curve for a Type Ia supernova. The peak is primarily due to the decay of nickel (Ni), while the later stage is powered by cobalt (Co).

Light curve for type Ia, over the course of one year SN 2018gv

Type Ia supernovae have a characteristic light curve, their graph of luminosity as a function of time after the explosion. Near the time of maximal luminosity, the spectrum contains lines of intermediate-mass elements from oxygen to calcium; these are the main constituents of the outer layers of the star. Months after the explosion, when the outer layers have expanded to the point of transparency, the spectrum is dominated by light emitted by material near the core of the star, heavy elements synthesized during the explosion; most prominently isotopes close to the mass of iron (iron-peak elements). The radioactive decay of nickel-56 through cobalt-56 to iron-56 produces high-energy photons, which dominate the energy output of the ejecta at intermediate to late times.

The use of Type Ia supernovae to measure precise distances was pioneered by a collaboration of Chilean and US astronomers, the Calán/Tololo Supernova Survey. In a series of papers in the 1990s the survey showed that while Type Ia supernovae do not all reach the same peak luminosity, a single parameter measured from the light curve can be used to correct unreddened Type Ia supernovae to standard candle values. The original correction to standard candle value is known as the Phillips relationship and was shown by this group to be able to measure relative distances to 7% accuracy. The cause of this uniformity in peak brightness is related to the amount of nickel-56 produced in white dwarfs presumably exploding near the Chandrasekhar limit.

The similarity in the absolute luminosity profiles of nearly all known Type Ia supernovae has led to their use as a secondary standard candle in extragalactic astronomy. Improved calibrations of the Cepheid variable distance scale and direct geometric distance measurements to NGC 4258 from the dynamics of maser emission when combined with the Hubble diagram of the Type Ia supernova distances have led to an improved value of the Hubble constant.

In 1998, observations of distant Type Ia supernovae indicated the unexpected result that the universe seems to undergo an accelerating expansion. Three members from two teams were subsequently awarded Nobel Prizes for this discovery.

Subtypes

Supernova remnant SNR 0454-67.2 is likely the result of a Type Ia supernova explosion.

There is significant diversity within the class of Type Ia supernovae. Reflecting this, a plethora of sub-classes have been identified. Two prominent and well-studied examples include 1991T-likes, an overluminous ${\displaystyle (M_V\lesssim -19.5)}$ subclass that exhibits particularly strong iron absorption lines and abnormally small silicon features, and 1991bg-likes, an exceptionally dim ${\displaystyle (M_V\gtrsim -18)}$ subclass characterized by strong early titanium absorption features and rapid photometric and spectral evolution. Despite their abnormal luminosities, members of both peculiar groups can be standardized by use of the Phillips relation, defined at blue wavelengths, to determine distance.