Chen, Ke-Jung 陳科榮

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The nebula phase of the magnetar-powered super-luminous supernova from our 3D simulation. At the moment, the supernova ejecta has expanded to a size similar to the solar system. Large scale mixing appears at the outer and inner region of ejecta. The resulting light curves and spectra are sensitive to the mixing that depends on stellar structure and the physical properties of magnetar.

World’s First 3D Simulations Reveal the Physics of Superluminous Supernovae

Gas density distribution of the first galaxy after 33 Myr of evolution calculated by Chen & Chen (in preparation). The gas and metals inside supernova remnants mixes with surrounding gas and other remnants and gradually collapses to the galaxy center. There are already over a thousand stars formed in the very central region. The star-forming region is tiny compared with the entire galaxy; thus, the stars are not shown here.

First galaxies

How First Supernovae Altered Early Star Formation?

Hydrodynamical evolution of supernovae and its effect on galaxy evolution

Cosmological simulations suggest that the first stars were very massive. They could emit a large amount of UV radiation and create extensive HII regions.

The HII region around the first star

The image shows the density distribution of a hypernova. An energetic explosion driven by both jets and disk winds leads to a large scale asymmetry in SN ejecta.

Hypernovae and GRB

AMR is used to resolve the finest structures in a hydro simulations.

CASTRO AMR

The 3D CASTRO simulation shows that many fluid instabilities occur during a PSN explosion.

3D pair-instability supernova model

The image shows the density structure of colliding shells ejected by a massive star before it dies. Such collisions can easily convert the kinetic energy of ejecta into thermal radiation.

3D radiation hydrodynamical simulation of Colliding Shells

The image shows the turbulent gas when a supernova collides with a nearby star-forming galaxy.

How a supernova affects a nearby star-forming galaxy?

This image is a slice through the interior of a supermassive star of 55,500 solar masses along the axis of symmetry. It shows the inner helium core in which nuclear burning is converting helium to oxygen, powering various fluid instabilities (swirling lines). This snapshot shows a moment one day after the onset of the explosion, when the radius of the outer circle would be slightly larger than that of the orbit of the Earth around the sun.

An exploding supermassive star

Metallicity distribution after the first supernova explosion. The metal-rich ejecta has been dispersed to ~ 1 kpc and polluted the pristine IGM gas at 20 Myr after the explosion.

Chemical Enrichment of the First Supernovae

Astrophysicist Ken Chen ran simulations on supercomputers to better understand the physical conditions that create superluminious supernova.

Magnetar-powered Superluminous Supernovae

Chen, Ke-Jung Assistant Research Fellow
	Office: ASMAB 1420 TEL: +886-2-2366-5457 FAX: +886-2-2367-7849 Email: kjchenasiaa.sinica.edu.tw Personal Homepage my PUBLONS information my ORCID information

Education and Positions

Assistant Research Fellow, ASIAA (2018~present)
Affiliated Center Scientist, National Center for Theoretical Sciences (2020~2021)
EACOA Fellow, NAOJ and ASIAA (2015~2018)
IAU-Gruber Fellow, Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, UC Santa Cruz, USA (2013~2015)
Johnston Fellow, Department of Physics, University of Minnesota, USA (2012~2013)
KITP Graduate Fellow, Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics, USA (2012)
Physics PhD, University of Minnesota (2013)

Honors & Awards

Career Development Award, Academic Sinica (2021)
Mentoring Award for College Student Research, MOST (2020)
Young Scholar Innovation Award, Foundation for the Advancement of Outstanding Scholarship (2019)
Outstanding Mentor Award, National Taiwan Science Education Center (2019)
Initial Employment Academic Research Award, Academic Sinica (2018)
Recruiting Special Outstanding Talent Award, MOST (2018)
The finalist in Poster and Graphics, NSF Scientific Visualization Competition (Vizzies) (2016)
The NERSC Achievement Award, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (2015)
EACOA Fellowship (2015)
The Best Dissertation, Honorable Mention, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities (2015)
IAU Gruber Fellowship (2013)
APS Travel Award for Excellence in Graduate Research (2 awards) (2012~2013)
Johnston Fellowship, University of Minnesota, USA (2012)
UC HiPACC Travel Grant (3 awards) (2011~2014)
APS DAP Travel Award (2 awards) (2011~2012)
AAS International Travel Grant (5 awards) (2010~2014)
Grants-in-Aid for Research, Sigma Xi Foundation (2012)
KITP Graduate Fellowship, Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics (2012)
The Best Paper Prize, Cefalu Meeting: Advances in Computational Astrophysics (2011)
The Best Poster Prize, Research Exhibition of Minnesota Supercomputing Institute (2011)
APS International Travel Grant (2011)
Thesis Research Grant, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities (2010)
NSF International Travel Grant (2009)
Edmond Franklin Fellowship, Physics Department, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities (2008)

Professional and Academic Societies

Member, International Astronomical Union (IAU) (2018~present)
Associate Member, Sigma Xi (2012~2015)
Member, American Physical Society (APS) (2010~2015)
Member, American Astronomical Society (AAS) (2010~2015)
Member, SciDAC Computational Astrophysics Consortium (2009~2012)

Research Interests

My research interest in computational astrophysics focuses on modeling the supernovae explosions and their cosmological impact by using multidimensional hydrodynamics/radiation/cosmological simulations. These supernovae are from the death of massive stars triggered by core-collapse, magnetar, pair-instability, and general-relativity instability.

Publications

My Publications from ADS

Journal Papers affiliated with ASIAA

Chen K-J; Tang C-Y; Whalen DJ; Ho M-Y; Tsai S-H; Ou P-S; Ono M, "How Population III Supernovae Determined the Properties of the First Galaxies" , ApJ: 964(1), id.91 (12pp), Mar, 2024 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Ono M; Nozawa T; Nagataki S; Kozyreva A; Orlando S; Miceli M; Chen K-J, "The impact of effective matter mixing based on three-dimensional hydrodynamical models on the molecule formation in the ejecta of SN 1987A" , ApJS: 271(1), id.33 (57pp), Mar, 2024 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Tang C-Y; Chen K-J, "Clumpy Structures within the Turbulent Primordial Cloud" , MNRAS: 529(4), 4248-4261, Mar, 2024 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Whalen DJ; Woosley SE; Zhang W, "Multidimensional Radiation Hydrodynamics Simulations of Pulsational Pair-Instability Supernovae" , ApJ: 955(1), id.39 (12pp), Sep, 2023 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Lin C-H; Chen K-J; Hwang C-Y, "Rapid Growth of Galactic Supermassive Black Holes through Accreting Giant Molecular Clouds during Major Mergers of their Host Galaxies" , ApJ: 952(2), id.121 (13 pp), Aug, 2023 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Ou P-S; Chen K-J; Chu Y-H; Tsai S-H, "Critical Metallicity of Cool Supergiant Formation. I. Effects on Stellar-mass Loss and Feedback" , ApJ: 944(1), id.34 (17 pp), Feb, 2023 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Tsai S-H; Chen K-J; Whalen D; Ou P-S; Woods TE, "The Evolution of Population III and Extremely Metal-Poor Binary Stars" , ApJ: 951(2), id.84, July, 2023 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J, "Physics of superluminous supernovae" , Int J Mod Phys D: 30(4), id.2130001-164, 2021 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Moriya TJ; Chen K-J; Nakajima K; Tominaga N; Blinnikov SI, "Observational properties of a general relativistic instability supernova from a primordial supermassive star" , MNRAS: 503(1), 1206-1213, May, 2021 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Woosley SE; Whalen DJ, "Three-dimensional Simulations of Magnetar-powered Superluminous Supernovae" , ApJ: 893(2), id.99 (10pp.), Apr, 2020 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Woosley SE; Whalen DJ, "Gas Dynamics of the Nickel-56 Decay Heating in Pair-instability Supernovae" , ApJ: 897(2), id.152 (14pp.), Jul, 2020 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Woods TE; Agarwal B; Bromm V; ...; Chen K-J; et al., "Titans of the early Universe: The Prato statement on the origin of the first supermassive black holes" , PASA: 36, id. e027 (38 pp.), Jan, 2019 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Heger A; Whalen DJ; Moriya TJ; Bromm V; Woosley SE, "Low-energy Population III supernovae and the origin of extremely metal-poor stars" , MNRAS: 467(4), 4731-4738, June, 2017 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Moriya TJ; Woosley S; et al., "Magnetar-powered Supernovae in Two Dimensions. II. Broad-line Supernovae Ic" , ApJ: 839(2), 85, April 18, 2017 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Whalen DJ; Wollenberg KMJ; et al., "How the First Stars Regulated Star Formation. II. Enrichment by Nearby Supernovae" , ApJ: 844(2), 111, Aug, 2017 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )
Chen K-J; Woosley SE; Sukhbold T, "Magnetar-Powered Supernovae in Two Dimensions. I. Superluminous Supernovae" , ApJ: 832(1), 73, Nov 20, 2016 [SCI] ( ADS | Fulltext )