PMAS observing campaign at Calar Alto 3.5m Telescope - Local host properties of nearby type Ia supernovae

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Martin Matthias Roth
• Subject Area: Astrophysics and Astronomy
• Term: from 2014 to 2015
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 257739552

Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) present today the strongest demonstrated technique for measuring the dark energy equation of state, and they off a key tool for the direct measurement of the Hubble constant parameter H0. However, as their progenitors are as yet undetermined, there are potentially uncontrolled cosmological biases. Host studies have highlighted correlations between SNe Ia and global properties sufficient to induce systematic errors. In this context, Rigault et al. 2013 demonstrated that analyzing the close environment of the SN enabled a better understanding of those biases. Here, we propose to go a step further by conducting the first study of the stellar populations in the direct environment of very nearby SNe Ia in order to significantly improve our control on SN-cosmological environmental biases.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants