报告人：Yi Yang，University of California, Berkeley

报告时间：2023年2月6日（周一）上午9：00

腾讯会议ID: 381-746-851

Abstract:

The geometry of supernovae and other cosmic explosions contains critical information about their mysterious nature. However, those events are too far to be spatially resolved even using the biggest telescopes. The most effective way to probe their shapes is polarimetry. For any deviation from spherical symmetry, electron scattering in asymmetric ejecta would lead to an incomplete cancellation of electric field vectors, hence producing net polarization signals.

Rapid detections of supernovae by modern high-cadence wide-field sky surveys combined with polarimetry follow-up observations allow their geometric properties to be measured from unprecedented early to late phases. I will give a brief overview of the lessons we learned about the shape of various types of cosmic explosions through polarimetric observations.

About the speaker:

Dr. Yang received a BS in Astronomy from Beijing Normal University in 2011, working on stellar variabilities with Professor Jian-Ning Fu. He then received his Ph.D. in Physics in 2017 at Texas A&M University under the guidance of Prof. Lifan Wang. Subsequently, he was a Benoziyo Prize Postdoctoral Fellow at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel until 2020, hosted by Prof. Avishay Gal-Yam. Currently, he is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California, Berkeley, working with Prof. Alexei Filippenko.

Dr. Yang has been heavily involved in modern wide-field sky surveys since 2017. His primary research interest is to understand the physics of exploding stars using the most advanced ground-based and space-based telescopes. He is particularly interested in probing their geometry by counting polarized photons. Besides, he also has a strong interest in the studies of cosmic dust. In short, he identifies himself as an active observer in the supernova community.