Astro Lunch

Reverse Engineering Supernovae

Core-collapse supernovae mark the catastrophic deaths of massive stars and are among the most powerful explosions in the universe. They shape and enrich their host galaxies; produce a variety of exotic objects including neutron stars, black holes, and some gamma-ray bursts; are a major site of nucleosynthesis and dust; are prodigious emitters of neutrinos; and are likely to be strong Galactic sources of gravitational waves. I will review how radio-through-X-ray investigations of the entire supernova life cycle -- from progenitor star, to explosion, to remnant -- are helping to “reverse engineer” solutions to key open questions in stellar evolution. I will also explore how unexpected connections between precision supernova tomography and future time domain surveys (including LSST) can provide firm observational tests for state-of-the-art simulations attempting to predict and interpret the multi-messenger signals from the next Galactic supernova.