LBV (Luminous Blue Variable) stars are massive and unstable stars characterized by large mass-lost due to intense stellar winds and aperiodic bursts. Due to their instability, LBV stars are also variable, with quasi-periodic oscillations of their luminosity of the order of 0.5-2 magnitudes. Typical examples of this class of stars are: the supergiant S Doradus in the Large Magellanic Clouds,
Supernova explosions are sorted into two categories: The thermonuclear explosions triggered by white dwarfs in close binary systems (type Ia) and those triggered by the gravitational collapse of the core of massive stars (type Ib/c and II). Because of the paucity of known supernova remnants younger than 1000 years, astronomers developed several models describing the evolution of supernova remnants to
Supernova remnants are clouds in rapid expansion produced by supernova explosions. They are often characterized by a complex morphology, resulting from the interaction between the expanding remnants and surrounding clouds. Supernova remnants also emit radiation on a wide band of the electromagnetic spectrum. This is due to the variety of phenomena occurring in these objects, and because of the different
Supernova explosions, occurring and the end of the life of massive stars, are ruled by a complex physics, and they can not be described by a simple spherically symmetric geometry. The rarity of these events make even more difficult to understand the physical processes involved during the explosions. For instance, on average only one supernova explodes in our Galaxy every
During the 1987 February 23rd night, astronomers observed the explosion of a supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. The exploded star was the blue supergiant Sanduleak (Sk) − 69o202, with a mass of 20 solar masses, and its explosion produced the supernova remnant SN 1987A. From that moment, SN 1987A was observed with
