Optical Counterpart to MAXI J1647-227
ATel #4179; P. Garnavich, K. Magno (Notre Dame), A. Applegate (Georgian Court U.)
on 16 Jun 2012; 08:24 UT
Credential Certification: Peter Garnavich (pgarnavi@gmail.com)
Subjects: Optical, X-ray, Binary, Transient
Referred to by ATel #: 4204
We observed the field of the X-ray transient MAXI J1647-227
(Negoro et al., ATEL#4175) with the Vatican Advance Technology
Telescope (VATT) and VATT4K CCD imager beginning June 16.244 UT.
R-band images reveal an optical source near the position of the Swift
localization (Kennea et al., ATEL#4178) that is not visible on the
Digitized Sky Survey. Based on USNO-B1.0 catalog stars in
the field, we find the optical transient has a position of
16:48:12.32 -23:00:53.56 (error of 0.2 arcsec) which is
within 2 arcsec of the Swift X-ray position.
From the USNO-B1 magnitudes we estimate the transient brightness
at R=19.4+/-0.1 mag. B-band images indicate the source is
relatively blue with B=20.7+/-0.1 mag.
