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R.P. Drake (University of Michigan)
A model is presented to account for the hot spots in SN 1987A. It is based on the assumption that the observed equatorial ring of emission is a consequence of the evolution of a constant-density circumstellar disk, pushed outward by the stellar wind from the progenitor star during its final phase as a blue supergiant. This model correctly accounts for the size and velocity of the observed ring, and predicts that the Rayleigh-Taylor (RT) instability at the interface between the disk and the wind will have become substantially nonlinear. By applying a recent theory of the nonlinear evolution of the RT instability, one finds spikes of material should have formed with approximately the spacing of the observed hot spots, and that emission between the spikes should commence in 2002.
This work was performed under support from the High-Energy-Density Grants Program of the US Department of Energy.