The First Supernovae Found with the Advanced Camera for Surveys

Blakeslee, J.P., Tsvetanov, Z.I., Riess, A.R., Benitez, N., Bouwens, R., Clampin, M., Cross, N., Ford, H.C., Franx, M., Golimowski, D.A., Gronwall, C., Hartig, G., Illingworth, G.D., Krist, J.E., Martel, A.R., Meurer, G.R., Postman, M., Sirianni, M., Sparks, W.B., Tran, H.D., White, R.L., Ardila, D., Bartko, F., Burrows, C., Broadhurst, T.J., Brown, R.A., Feldman, P.D., Kimble, R.A., Lesser, M., Menanteau, F., Miley, G., Rosati, P., and Zheng, W. .

We report discovery and follow-up observations of two distant Type Ia supernovae found with Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). Both supernovae were discovered serendipitously in images of the Hubble Deep Field North taken in the F775W, F850LP, and G800L passbands about two months after the instrument was installed on HST. Spectra extracted from the G800L grism exposures confirm that the supernovae are of Type Ia, were both near maximum luminosity at the time of discovery, and have redshifts of z=0.47 and z=0.95. Follow-up observations were conducted with ACS in the F775W and F850LP filters and with NICMOS in the F110W bandpass. The resulting light curves allow us to calibrate the supernovae luminosities and place them on the Type Ia Hubble diagram. Our results demonstrate the enormous potential of ACS for discovering and confirming distant Type Ia supernovae, and therefore of testing and constraining the accelerating universe cosmology. \

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