Spectra and Light Curves of Six Type Ia Supernovae at 0.511 < z < 1.12
  and the Union2 Compilation
  We report on work to increase the number of well-measured Type Ia supernovae
(SNe Ia) at high redshifts. Light curves, including high signal-to-noise HST
data, and spectra of six SNe Ia that were discovered during 2001 are presented.
Additionally, for the two SNe with z>1, we present ground-based J-band
photometry from Gemini and the VLT. These are among the most distant SNe Ia for
which ground based near-IR observations have been obtained. We add these six
SNe Ia together with other data sets that have recently become available in the
literature to the Union compilation (Kowalski et al. 2008). We have made a
number of refinements to the Union analysis chain, the most important ones
being the refitting of all light curves with the SALT2 fitter and an improved
handling of systematic errors. We call this new compilation, consisting of 557
supernovae, the Union2 compilation. The flat concordance LambdaCDM model
remains an excellent fit to the Union2 data with the best fit constant equation
of state parameter w=-0.997^{+0.050}_{-0.054} (stat) ^{+0.077}_{-0.082}
(stat+sys\ together) for a flat universe, or w=-1.035^{+0.055}_{-0.059}
(stat)^{+0.093}_{-0.097} (stat+sys together) with curvature. We also present
improved constraints on w(z). While no significant change in w with redshift is
detected, there is still considerable room for evolution in w. The strength of
the constraints depend strongly on redshift. In particular, at z > 1, the
existence and nature of dark energy are only weakly constrained by the data.
