Discovery of a Probable Nova in M81

ATel #11248; K. Hornoch, H. Kucakova (Ondrejov), S. C. Williams (Lancaster), M. Henze (SDSU), G. Sala, J. Jose (UPC-IEEC), H. Meusinger (TLS), M. J. Darnley (LJMU), A. Kaur, D. H. Hartmann (Clemson), A. W. Shafter (SDSU)
on 31 Jan 2018; 15:53 UT
Credential Certification: Steven Williams (scw@astro.ljmu.ac.uk)

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The M81 nova monitoring collaboration reports the discovery of a probable nova in M81 on a co-added 3150-s unfiltered CCD frame taken on 2018 Jan. 30.776 UT with the 0.65-m telescope at Ondrejov (OND). The nova candidate is also visible on prediscovery R-band images taken on 2018 Jan 29.055 UT and 29.875 UT with the 0.80-m telescope Joan Oro (TJO).

The object designated PNV J09555926+6903517 is located at R.A. = 9h55m59.26, Decl. = +69o03'51".7 (equinox 2000.0), which is 139.8" east and 3.4" south of the center of M81 (see link to discovery image below).

Here we list the observing dates and corresponding photometry:

 
  Date [UT]    |  Mag  | Err  | Filter  | Telescope> 
2018-01-26.817 | <22.1 |      | C       | OND  
2018-01-29.055 |  21.2 | 0.4  | R	| TJO 
2018-01-29.875 |  20.5 | 0.4  | R 	| TJO    
2018-01-30.776 |  20.3 | 0.15 | C       | OND 
2018-01-30.996 |  20.3 | 0.15 | C       | OND 
 

The OND 0.65-m is a reflecting telescope at the Ondrejov observatory operated jointly by the Astronomical Institute of ASCR and the Astronomical Institute of the Charles University of Prague, Czech Republic. It uses a Moravian Instruments G2-3200 CCD camera (with a Kodak KAF-3200ME sensor and standard BVRI photometric filters) mounted at the prime focus. The TJO is a 80-cm Ritchey-Chretien F/9.6 telescope at the Observatori Astronomic del Montsec, owned by the Catalan Government and operated by the Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya, Spain. It uses a Finger Lakes PL4240-1-BI CCD Camera with a Class 1 Basic Broadband coated 2k x 2k chip with 13.5 microns square pixels. The TJO photometry is based on the SDSS DR7 photometry catalogue. The unfiltered OND photometry was calibrated against R-band comparison stars from Perelmuter & Racine (1995).

Discovery image