Optical and Near-Infrared Observations of Galactic Nova TCP J18104219-1534184
ATel #13535; Vipin Kumar, Vishal Joshi, Mudit K. Srivastava (Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, India), D. P.K. Banerjee (CSIR; Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, India)
on 2 Mar 2020; 12:48 UT
Credential Certification: Vishal Joshi (vjoshi@prl.res.in)
Subjects: Nova, Star, Transient, Variables
We present optical and Near-Infrared observations of TCP J18104219-1534184 discovered by Hideo Nishimura on 2020-02-22.84UT (CBAT follow-up) and subsequently classified as a classical nova by Aydi et al. (ATel #13517). Further optical spectroscopy on 2020-02-23.862 UT by Taguchi et al. (ATel #13519) also confirms the object to be a classical nova shortly after maximum. The spectrum showed broad Balmer and Fe II emission lines with P Cygni profiles as well as several emission lines of Na I, O I, and Ca II/Mg II.
We obtained low-resolution spectra of the nova on 2020-02-27.01UT and 2020-02-28.03UT using the in-house developed spectrograph MFOSC-P (Srivastava et al. 2018, Proc. SPIE, 10702-163) on the PRL 1.2-m telescope at Mt.Abu, India. The spectra were recorded in three grating modes having dispersions of 3.8, 1.9 and 1.1 angstroms per pixel and spectral ranges of 4650-8345, 4780-6720, and 5960-7100 angstroms respectively. The spectra show the same lines discussed by Taguchi et al. but the P-Cygni absorption features have disappeared or weakened very largely. The FWHM and FWZI values of the H-alpha line are large and estimated to be ~4200 km/s and ~7500 km/s respectively. The Balmer line profiles are relatively flat-topped. NIR photometry of the nova was obtained on 2020-02-26.0208 UT using the Near-Infrared Imager-Camera (NICS) instrument on the PRL 1.2-m telescope at Mt.Abu, India. The derived J, H and Ks magnitudes are 9.5, 7.9 and 7.4 respectively with the typical error of 0.1 magnitudes. These values and the slope of the optical spectra suggest considerable reddening towards the nova.
