INTEGRAL FIELD SPECTROSCOPY OF SUPERNOVA EXPLOSION SITES: CONSTRAINING THE MASS AND METALLICITY OF THE PROGENITORS. II. TYPE II-P AND II-L SUPERNOVAE

Thirteen explosion sites of Type II-P and II-L supernovae (SNe) in nearby galaxies have been observed using integral field spectroscopy, enabling both spatial and spectral study of the explosion sites. We used the properties of the parent stellar population of the coeval SN progenitor star to derive its metallicity and initial mass. The spectrum of the parent stellar population yields estimates of metallicity via the strong-line method and age via a comparison with simple stellar population models. These metallicity and age parameters are adopted for the progenitor star. Age, or lifetime of the star, was used to derive the initial (zero-age main sequence) mass of the star using comparisons with stellar evolution models. With this technique, we were able to determine the metallicities and initial masses of the SN progenitors in our sample. Our results indicate that some Type II SN progenitors may have been stars with masses comparable to those of SN Ib/c progenitors.