DA 530: A Supernova Remnant in a Stellar Wind Bubble

The high-latitude supernova remnant (SNR) DA 530 (G93.3+6.9), apparently a typical shell remnant, has highly polarized radio continuum emission and a very uniform circumferential magnetic field. We present new radio continuum (408 and 1420 MHz) and H I line observations, made with the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory Synthesis Telescope, and we have made the first detection of X-ray emission from the SNR, using the ROSAT Position-Sensitive Proportional Counter. The SNR lies within a shell of H I, possibly created by an earlier stellar wind, whose kinematic distance is nominally 2.5 kpc but whose actual distance may be larger. The X-ray emission is extremely faint. A Raymond-Smith ionization-equilibrium model fits the data and suggests a very low density, ~0.05 cm-3, consistent with the occurrence of the supernova in a stellar wind cavity, but this model yields an explosion energy 100 times lower than the accepted value. A nonequilibrium shock model, incorporating a range of ionization timescales, is able to give more realistic physical parameters for the supernova remnant. On the balance of the evidence, we place DA 530 at a distance of 3.5 kpc, the largest distance permitted by the H I observations, where it lies 420 pc above the Galactic plane. The explosion, probably a Type Ia supernova, in a low-density cavity has resulted in weak X-ray emission and slow evolution. The explosion energy was 3.9 × 1050 ergs and the age is ~5000 years. The remnant, having swept up 3.9 M☉ in an ambient density of ~0.01 cm-3, is only now in the adiabatic phase, and this explains the absence of detected optical emission. Despite the low ambient density the efficiency of generation of synchrotron radio emission is ~0.4%, higher than in some historical SNRs. The ratio of radio to X-ray flux is about 100 times that for the remnant of SN 1006, which has comparable radio continuum properties. The very uniform magnetic field is not explained. DA 530 joins a small group of remnants at high Galactic latitude with unusual features, perhaps resulting from low ambient densities. Inhomogeneous nonequilibrium ionization models may be required for the interpretation of the X-ray emission from many other older SNRs.