Observable Signatures of Supernova Shock Breakout in Confined Circumstellar Medium

Abstract

Supernova shock breakout encodes rich information about stellar explosions, including the properties of the progenitor, the explosion mechanism, and the circumstellar environment. We present the first two-dimensional multigroup radiation-hydrodynamic simulations of shock breakout from Red Supergiant (RSG) progenitor stars embedded in confined circumstellar medium (CSM) produced shortly before core collapse. Our simulations reveal that radiation escaping ahead of the shock forms a radiative precursor that pre-accelerates the CSM and induces strong hydrodynamic mixing. This mixing substantially modifies the structure and evolution of the breakout photosphere and, consequently, the emergent radiation. The resulting bolometric light curves reach peak luminosities of $1.43$-$3.15 \times 10^{44}\ \mathrm{erg\ s^{-1}}$ with duration of $4.1\text{--}35.4$~hr, with these signatures controlled by the CSM mass and the confined radius. Our multiwavelength calculations further reveal a pronounced extreme-ultraviolet emission, where ionizing photons of energies ${\ge}54.4$~eV can sustain flash-ionized He-II and power strong emission from its recombination line of $λ4686$ angstrom. Furthermore, we identify diagnostic signatures of shock breakout with dense CSM and assess their detectability with Einstein Probe and ULTRASAT. Our models and predictions provide promising diagnostics of shock breakout in CSM that may be detectable by current and forthcoming high-cadence ultraviolet and X-ray space telescopes.