Alexey Tolstov

My research interests mostly concern the question of how do massive stars die. This question is interesting to me to understand the physics of supernovae, kilonovae, gamma-ray bursts, stellar evolution and the chemical enrichment history of the Universe. I mainly focus on external problem of supernova phenomena - supernova outbursts. The main goal here is to derive the supernova properties by comparing the radiation hydro numerical simulations of supernova outbursts from shock breakout to remnant phase at all wavelengths with photometric and spectroscopic observations. Thus, the combination of all main pillars of modern astronomy is used: observations, theory and computations. I am interested in all types of supernova, but most of all, zero- and low-metallicity supernovae, superluminous supernovae, and hypernovae.

     Project Researcher, IPMU, Japan

     E-mail:  alexey.tolstov _at_ ipmu.jp

     My papers in NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

• First supernovae
  "Photometric identification of first supernovae: multicolor light curve simulations" PDF
  "Multicolor light curves simulation of Pop III core-collapse supernovae: from shock breakout to ⁵⁶Co decay" PDF
  "Blue is an indicator of first star’s supernova explosions" IPMU Press Release
  

• Superluminous supernovae: CSM vs. PISN vs. Magnetar
  "Scenarios of superluminous supernovae in radiation hydrodynamics simulations" PDF
  "Ultraviolet light from superluminous supernova key to revealing explosion mechanism" IPMU Press Release
  "Violent Collision of Massive Supernova with Surrounding Gas Powers Superluminous Supernovae" IPMU Press Release
  

• Hypernovae and GRB-SN Connection
  "Multicolor light curve and spectrum simulations of superluminous supernovae and hypernovae" Conference proceedings PDF

• Shock breakouts and relativistic radiative transfer
  "Modeling of SNe I b/c Shock Breakouts: from XRF080109/SN2008D to the Future Surveys" PDF
  "Radiative transfer at relativistic shocks" PDF

• Supernovae from 8-12 solar mass stars
  

• Accretion-induced collapse of WDs and rapidly-evolving transients
  

• Catalog of theoretical models
  

Simulated light curves from shock breakout (ultraviolet) through plateau (red, green and blue colors) to exponential decay and artist's conception of evolution of metal-poor and “metal-rich” supernovae at different phases and. Both shock breakout and “plateau” phases are shorter, bluer, and fainter for metal-poor supernova in comparison with “metal-rich” supernova. (Credit: Kavli IPMU) IPMU Press Release

Artist’s conception of 3 popular SLSN scenarios: shock-interacting, magnetar-powered and pair-instability supernova. SLSN Gaia16apd is most likely a shock-interacting supernova in which radiating shock waves easily produce enormous amounts of UV light. (Credit: Kavli IPMU) IPMU Press Release