EVLA Observations of the Intermediate Luminosity Optical Transient PTF10fqs
ATel #2595; Laura Chomiuk (U. of Wisconsin, NRAO), Alicia Soderberg and Edo Berger (Harvard/CfA)
on 4 May 2010; 03:44 UT
Distributed as an Instant Email Notice Transients
Credential Certification: Laura Chomiuk (chomiuk@astro.wisc.edu)
Subjects: Radio, Nova, Supernovae, Transient
We observed the intermediate luminosity optical transient PTF10fqs (Kasliwal et al., ATEL #2590) with the Expanded Very Large Array beginning on May 1.21 UT under our NRAO Key Science Project "Exotic Explosions, Eruptions, and Disruptions: A New Transient Phase-Space" (PI Soderberg). We do not detect a radio source coincident with the optical position at a central frequency of 4.96 GHz (bandwidth of 216 MHz), with an upper limit of 60 microJy (3 sigma). At the distance of M99 (15.5 Mpc), this corresponds to a spectral luminosity limit of L_nu < 1.7e+25 erg/s/Hz. In comparison with core-collapse supernovae observed in the radio band on a comparable timescale, this limit coincides with the low end of the luminosity distribution. In comparison with other intermediate luminosity optical transients observed in the radio band, our PTF10fqs limit is a factor of 3 higher than the limit for SN 2008S (Chandra and Soderberg, ATEL #1382) and a factor of 60 times higher than the limit for NGC300 OT2008-1 (Berger et al. 2009, ApJ, 699, 1850).
