Final Explosions and Collapse

Abstract

We have seen that stars can evolve to the white-dwarf stage through a sequence of consecutive hydrostatic states if they develop a degenerate core and have final masses less than the Chandrasekhar limit M_Ch. It is not well known, however, how much mass the stars can have initially (on the main sequence) in order to end this way. Sometimes an upper limit of 4M_⊙ is quoted, but it may be even up to 10M_⊙. The main uncertainty here is the total amount of mass lost by stellar winds.