Abstract

A detailed study spanning approximately a year has been conducted on the Type Ib supernova (SN) 2007Y. Imaging was obtained from X-ray to radio wavelengths, and a comprehensive set of multi-band (w2m2w1u'g' r'i'UBVYJHKs) light curves and optical spectroscopy is presented. A virtually complete bolometric light curve is derived, from which we infer a 56Ni mass of 0.06 M?. The early spectrum strongly resembles SN 2005bf and exhibits high-velocity features of Ca ii and Ha; during late epochs the spectrum shows evidence of an ejecta-wind interaction. Nebular emission lines have similar widths and exhibit profiles that indicate a lack of major asymmetry in the ejecta. Late phase spectra are modeled with a non-LTE code, from which we find 56Ni, O, and total-ejecta masses (excluding He) to be 0.06, 0.2, and 0.42 M?, respectively, below 4500 km s-1. The 56Ni mass confirms results obtained from the bolometric light curve. The oxygen abundance suggests that the progenitor was most likely a ˜3.3 M? He core star that evolved from a zero-age-main-sequence mass of 10-13 M?. The explosion energy is determined to be ˜1050 erg, and the mass-loss rate of the progenitor is constrained from X-ray and radio observations to be = 10-6 M? yr-1. SN 2007Y is among the least energetic normal Type Ib SNe ever studied. © 2009. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A.