MERLIN radio upper limits on the optical transient in M82
ATel #1522; M. K. Argo, R. J. Beswick, S. T. Garrington, T. W. B. Muxlow, R. Spencer, P. Thomasson, (Manchester), R. P. Fender, T. J. Maccarone (Southampton)
on 14 May 2008; 13:54 UT
Credential Certification: Rob Beswick (Robert.Beswick@manchester.ac.uk)
Subjects: Radio, Globular Cluster, Nova, Transient
We report MERLIN radio observations of the recent optical transient (Atels#1501,1503,1512) in M82. Observations were made between 1200UT 1st May 2008 and 1600UT 3rd May 2008 at 4994MHz. No radio source was detected above 190 microJy/beam (3-sigma) within an area of radius 0.5 arcmin centred upon the reported position of the optical transient (Atel#1501). This non-detection at radio wavelengths, along with the non-detection by Swift (Atel#1503) and recent spectroscopic results (Atel#1512) support the hypothesis that this transient is a classical nova in M82.
