OGLE constraints on the Nova VVV-NOV-002 (OGLE-2011-NOVA-01)
ATel #4879; L. Wyrzykowski, A. Udalski (Warsaw University Astronomical Observatory, Poland), on behalf of the OGLE team
on 12 Mar 2013; 09:24 UT
Credential Certification: Lukasz Wyrzykowski (wyrzykow@ast.cam.ac.uk)
Subjects: Optical, Nova, Transient
Recently Saito et al. (ATel #4830) reported on the detection of a nova
outburst in the Galactic bulge fields observed by the VVV IR survey. We
report that this object was detected by the Early Warning System (EWS)
of OGLE-IV (http://ogle.astrouw.edu.pl) yet in 2012 - as a potential
microlensing candidate. It was later rejected due to non-microlensing
light curve shape.
Moreover, the investigation of archival OGLE-IV images revealed that the
actual nova explosion was much brighter and occurred between 2011,
October 11 (last non-detection) and 2011, October 16 (first detection).
The object was severely saturated on 100s exposure images in the I-band
taken on the three frames at the end of the 2011 Galactic bulge season
(October 16, 20, 26) and therefore went undetected. First image in the
2012 Bulge season was taken on February 2 when the object was found
rising until its second maximum brightness on 2012, March 6 at 16.6 mag.
Since then the object was declining roughly with the rate t2 ~ 260
days, corresponding to MI about -7.5, in agreement with a Nova
exploding in the Galactic bulge, assuming AV~6 mag (ATel #4830).
On the recent images taken, on 2013, March 11, the nova is still
visible, roughly at magnitude 19.5 in the I-band. The shape of the light
curve indicates this is a relatively rare D-class Nova (Strope, Schaefer &
Henden 2010) characterized by dust dips.
Finding chart, individual images of the outburst and the light curve are available under this link.
