Host galaxies of SNe Ia in SDSS-II SN survey

We re-discover, to high significance, the strong correlation between host galaxy type and the width of the observed SN light curve, i.e., fainter, quickly declining SNe Ia favor passive host galaxies, while brighter, slowly declining Ia's favor star-forming galaxies. We also find evidence (at between 2{sigma} and 3{sigma}) that SNe Ia are ~0.1+/-0.04mag brighter in passive host galaxies than in star-forming hosts, after the SN Ia light curves have been standardized using the light-curve shape and color variations.

This difference in brightness is present in both the SALT2 and MCLS2k2 light-curve fitting methodologies. We see evidence for differences in the SN Ia color relationship between passive and star-forming host galaxies, e.g., for the MLCS2k2 technique, we see that SNe Ia in passive hosts favor a dust law of R_V_=1.0+/-0.2, while SNe Ia in star-forming hosts require R_V_=1.8^+0.2^_-0.4_. The significance of these trends depends on the range of SN colors considered.