Nuclear physics serves as the foundation of much of the dynamics of infall, core bounce, shock propagation, and mantle ejection. Faithful modeling of this physics is clearly an essential step in formulating a core collapse supernova standard model. This aspect of supernova modeling is in an early state of development.
One of the crucial components of the microphysics concerns the interactions of neutrinos with matter. One important component of TSI's nuclear physics effort is the development of modern, sophisticated models of neutrino interactions with nuclei. As densities in the collapsing core rise, the response of nuclear matter to neutrino interactions also becomes important. Realistic modeling of weak interactions in both regimes is essential to determining the effects of detailed nuclear physics on the explosion mechanism and subsequent observables.
The emission of neutrinos from a Galactic supernova will be observable with terrestrial detectors. One goal of TSI is to produce realistic neutrino signatures that will serve as a diagnostic for core collapse supernova models and a bridge to fundamental particle and nuclear physics, including neutrino flavor mixing.
One of TSI's primary goals is to predict the element production and ejection in core collapse supernovae. In particular, one focus will be modelling r-process nucleosynthesis. This will require state-of-the-art neutrino transport and weak interaction physics. Element production in the r-process will also serve as a diagnostic for supernova neutrino transport and proto-neutron star physics.
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