Follow-up of SN 2025wny III: Spectroscopic Time-delay Measurements of a Strongly Gravitationally Lensed Superluminous Supernova

arXiv:2608.28416 · astro-ph.CO · Submitted 2026-08-28 · Read on arXiv

astro-ph.CO

Submitted: 2026-08-28

Updated: 2026-08-28

Comments: Submitted to the ApJ Focus Issue on SN 2025wny (Paper III)

License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

The gist: We present spatially resolved spectra and infer the time-delays between the multiple images of the strongly gravitationally lensed superluminous supernova (SLSN) 2025wny at z=2.015.

Abstract

We present spatially resolved spectra and infer the time-delays between the multiple images of the strongly gravitationally lensed superluminous supernova (SLSN) 2025wny at z=2.015. SN 2025wny is the first known spatially resolved strongly lensed SLSN and provides a unique opportunity to measure lensing delays through the temporal evolution of supernova spectra. We present a spectroscopic dataset spanning several months, including spatially resolved spectra of images A, B, C, D, and E. We identify and measure the wavelength evolution of spectral features using Gaussian-process modeling. The time delays are inferred by jointly fitting the temporal evolution of the spectral features, yielding Δt AB=-10.3 plus or minus 2.3, Δt AC=0.1 plus or minus 3.6, Δt AD=-65.7 plus or minus 3.5, and Δt AE=3.7 plus or minus 8.8 days (68% confidence intervals). These are the among most precise time-delay measurements obtained for a lensed supernova to date, whether from spectroscopic or photometric methods. The longest delay (Δt AD) is particularly well constrained, with a 5% precision. Combined with the lens model presented by Mörtsell et al. (2026), the spectroscopic time-delays give a Hubble constant H 0 = 70.2+8.2-6.1 km/s/Mpc. Our analysis demonstrates that spectroscopic evolution provides an independent and complementary route to time-delay measurements in lensed supernova systems, avoiding reliance on photometric light curves alone. As future surveys discover larger samples of lensed supernovae, spectroscopic time-delay measurements will provide an important avenue for precision cosmography.

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