Overview
- The European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope observed SN 2024ggi just 26 hours after its detection and 29 hours after shock breakout.
- Using the FORS2 instrument for spectropolarimetry, the team reconstructed the explosion’s geometry at a stage that normal imaging cannot resolve.
- The initial ejecta formed an olive-like, axisymmetric shape that later flattened as it encountered surrounding material but kept the same symmetry axis.
- Data indicate the progenitor was a red supergiant of roughly 12–15 solar masses in galaxy NGC 3621 about 22 million light-years away, with an equatorial disk of gas and dust.
- The study, published in Science Advances, allows researchers to rule out some supernova models and suggests the core likely became a neutron star, according to a co-author.