Probing the Type Ia environment with Light Echoes

Abstract

In general, Light Echoes (LE) are beautiful, rather academical and therefore unavoidably useless phenomena. In some cases, however, they can give interesting information about the environment surrounding the exploding star. After giving a brief introduction to the subject, I describe its application to the case of Type Ia Supernovae and discuss the implications for progenitors and their location within the host galaxies.

6 pages, 1 figure. To appear in "Supernovae as Cosmological Lighthouses", W. Shea and M. Turatto eds