Anderson, L.D., Camilo, F., Faerber, T. et al. (13 more authors) (2025) Supernova remnant candidates discovered by the SARAO MeerKAT Galactic Plane Survey. Astronomy & Astrophysics, 693. A247. ISSN 0004-6361
Abstract
Context. Sensitive radio continuum data could bring the number of known supernova remnants (SNRs) in the Galaxy more in line with what is expected. Due to confusion in the Galactic plane, however, faint SNRs can be challenging to distinguish from brighter H II regions and filamentary radio emission.
Aims. We exploited new 1.3 GHz SARAO MeerKAT Galactic Plane Survey (SMGPS) radio continuum data, which cover 251° ≤ ℓ ≤ 358° and 2° ≤ ℓ ≤ 61° at | b | ≤ 1.5°, to search for SNR candidates in the Milky Way disk.
Methods. We also used mid-infrared data from the Spitzer GLIMPSE, Spitzer MIPSGAL, and WISE surveys to help identify SNR candidates. These candidates are sources of extended radio continuum emission that lack mid-infrared counterparts, are not known as H II regions in the WISE Catalog of Galactic H II Regions, and have not been previously identified as SNRs.
Results. We locate 237 new Galactic SNR candidates in the SMGPS data. We also identify and confirm the expected radio morphology for 201 objects classified in the literature as SNRs and 130 previously identified SNR candidates. The known and candidate SNRs have similar spatial distributions and angular sizes.
Conclusions. The SMGPS data allowed us to identify a large population of SNR candidates that can be confirmed as true SNRs using radio polarization measurements or by deriving radio spectral indices. If the 237 candidates are confirmed as true SNRs, it would approximately double the number of known Galactic SNRs in the survey area, alleviating much of the discrepancy between the known and expected populations.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Authors 2025. Open Access article, published by EDP Sciences, under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
Keywords: | H II regions, ISM: supernova remnants, radio continuum: ISM |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences (Leeds) > School of Physics and Astronomy (Leeds) > Astrophysics (Leeds) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number STFC (Science and Technology Facilities Council) ST/W00125X/1 STFC (Science and Technology Facilities Council) ST/X001016/1 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 03 Feb 2025 11:26 |
Last Modified: | 03 Feb 2025 11:26 |
Published Version: | https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2025/0... |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | EDP Sciences |
Identification Number: | 10.1051/0004-6361/202451038 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:222755 |
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