Giovedì 06 novembre alle ore 15:00, il Dott. Giorgio Valerin (INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Padova, IT) terrà il seminario dal titolo “Probing accretion and stellar properties in the Orion Nebula with VLT/X-Shooter”.

Abstract:
Electron-Capture Supernovae (ECSNe) are a type of weak stellar explosions theorised to arise from stars with initial masses roughly between 8 and 10 solar masses. Models which aim to reproduce the evolution of these stars are challenged by complex processes, such as convection, thermal pulses and episodic mass loss events. In this context, observations of ECSNe could provide valuable empirical constraints, simultaneously improving our understanding of both the transient sky and stellar evolution. However, there is still no consensus on whether a genuine ECSN has ever been observed. In this seminar I will present the observational properties of two classes of transients that are promising ECSN candidates. The first one is a subset of Type IIP Supernovae (SNe IIP), comprised of the events displaying unusually low kinetic energies and luminosities, hence dubbed Low Luminosity SNe IIP. The second class encompasses Intermediate-Luminosity Red Transients (ILRTs), which belong to the broader category of “gap transients”, characterised by peak luminosities between classical novae and standard supernovae. The discussion will explore the arguments supporting their classification as ECSNe, potential challenges to this interpretation, and observational strategies aimed at securing a definitive ECSN detection.