Do Type Ia supernovae stem from the explosion of white dwarf mergers?

Type Ia supernovae happen when a white dwarf, the “corpse” of a star similar to the Sun, absorbs material from a twin star until it reaches a critical mass--1.4 times that of the Sun—and explodes. Because of their origin, all these explosions share a very similar luminosity. This uniformity made type Ia supernovae ideal objects to measure distances in the universe, but the study of supernova 2014J suggests a scenario that would invalidate them as “standard candles".

A new model postulating the fusion of two white dwarfs is now challenging the predominant one, consisting of a white dwarf and a normal star. The new scenario does not imply the existence of a maximum mass limit and will not, therefore, necessarily produce explosions of similar luminosity. 

Radio observation makes it possible to reveal what stellar systems lie behind type Ia supernovae. If the explosion proceeds from a white dwarf being nourished by a twin star, for example, a great amount of gas should be present in the environment; after the explosion, the material ejected by the supernova will collide with this gas and produce an intense emission of X rays and radio waves. By contrast, a couple of white dwarfs will not generate this gaseous envelope and, therefore, there will be no emission of either X rays or radio waves.

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