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Electromagnetic Follow-up of the Sub-Solar Mass Gravitational Wave Candidate S251112cm: Kilonova Constraints and a Coincident IIb Supernova

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abstract

On November 12th, 2025 the LIGO--Virgo--KAGRA (LVK) collaboration reported gravitational waves (GWs) from a compact object merger candidate (S251112cm) with at least one sub-solar mass component. Using the Dark Energy Camera (DECam), the Fraunhofer Telescope at Wendelstein Observatory (FTW), and the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), we surveyed $56\%$ of the GW localization region beginning $2.4$~hours after the GW alert. We find no kilonova (KN) counterpart, and use radiative-transfer models to rule out $42\%$ (ZTF), $68\%$ (DECam), and $92\%$ (FTW) of the KN models as possible emission from this GW candidate. Within the recently proposed disk-fragmentation (``superkilonova'') model for generating sub-solar mass neutron star mergers from stellar core-collapse, the delay between the supernova explosion time and the GW merger time is estimated to be less than a few days. Searching this time window prior to the GW event, we identify and spectroscopically classify a IIb supernova (SN~2025adtq), with a spatial association odds ratio of $\log_{10}\mathcal{I} \approx 4.8$, a chance coincidence probability of ${\sim}2$--$9\%$, and an estimated explosion time ${\sim}2$ days prior to S251112cm. SN~2025adtq is the second Type~IIb supernova found in spatial and temporal coincidence with a sub-solar mass GW candidate, following the previously reported S250818k/SN~2025ulz association; jointly, we measure an odds ratio that favors the association hypothesis over the null, however, when conditioned on finding a coincident supernova by chance, the odds ratio disfavors association. Together, these results provide suggestive but inconclusive evidence for the superkilonova formation channel.

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astro-ph.HE 2

years

2026 2

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UNVERDICTED 2

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representative citing papers

A Collapsar-Disk Origin for GW190814

astro-ph.HE · 2026-06-22 · unverdicted · novelty 6.0

GW190814 is proposed to originate from a collapsar-disk fragment merging with the central black hole, potentially preceded by SN2019npv ~60 days earlier, yielding H0 = 70.5 (+9.2, -6.4) km/s/Mpc.

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