Helium Shell Detonations from AM CVn Systems: New Results on SNe .Ia

Ken Shen (UCSB)

AM CVn systems are ultracompact binaries consisting of a He donor and a WD
accretor. I will discuss the nuclear burning that results from the He
mass transfer, which can possibly culminate in a detonation and a faint
thermonuclear .Ia supernova. I will also discuss current work on the
appearance of these explosive events, using a hydrodynamic simulation
coupled to a Monte Carlo radiative transfer code. The resulting synthetic
light curves and spectra will guide current surveys such as the Palomar
Transient Factory and Pan-STARRS-1, which may be able to observe a few of
these SNe .Ia every year.