Exceptionally bright state of blazar 1FGL J1040.5+0616 detected by MASTER

ATel #4930; D. Denisenko, V. Lipunov, E. Gorbovskoy, N. Tiurina, P. Balanutsa, V. Kornilov, A. Belinski, N. Shatskiy, V. Chazov, A. Kuznetsov, V. Yecheistov, D. Zimnukhov (Moscow State University, SAI), V. Krushinsky, I. Zalozhnih, A. Popov, A. Bourdanov, A. Punanova (Ural Federal University), K. Ivanov, S. Yazev, N. Budnev, E. Konstantinov, O. Chuvalaev, V. Poleshchuk, O. Gress, A. Frolova, (Irkutsk State University), A. Parkhomenko, A. Tlatov, D. Dormidontov, V. Senik (Kislovodsk solar station of the Pulkovo observatory RAS), V. Yurkov, Y. Sergienko, D. Varda, E. Sinyakov (Blagoveshchensk Educational University), P. Podvorotny, V. Shumkov, S. Shurpakov (MASTER team members), H. Levato, C. Saffe (ICATE), C. Mallamaci, C. Lopez and F. Podest (OAFA)
on 31 Mar 2013; 18:23 UT
Credential Certification: Vladimir Lipunov (lipunov2007@gmail.com)

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MASTER OT J104031.63+061721.8 - flaring blazar at the historical highest level

MASTER-Amur auto-detection system discovered OT source at (RA, Dec) = 10h 40m 31.63s +06d 17m 21.8s on 2013-03-31.59076 UT. The OT unfiltered magnitude is 15.7m (limit 18.6m). The OT is seen in 3 images. We have reference image without OT on 2010-03-17.64138 UT with unfiltered magnitude limit 18.0m. The object was previously detected at 16.3m on MASTER-Amur image of 2012-12-17.673 UT.

The OT is obviously identical to the object detected by Catalina Sky Survey CSS081229:104032+061721 (A. Mahabal et al., ATel #1884, 2008). The archival CSS light curve covers 8-year interval from Jan. 2005. After Dec. 2008 flare to 16.8m the object has returned to the quiescent level (~20m) in 2009, since then it has shown at least 3 flaring episodes gradually raising by ~2.5m then fading by ~1.5m with the general brightening trend at ~1m per year.

The object at quiescence is identical to SDSS J104031.62+061721.7 with the magnitudes u=21.04, g=20.34, r=19.85, i=19.34, z=18.92 and redshift z=0.7351(5). The object has also an UV counterpart GALEX J104031.6+061721 with two entries in GALEX catalog: FUV=23.13+/-0.33, NUV=21.53+/-0.14 and FUV=22.53+/-0.28, NUV=21.66+/-0.09. It is likely identical to the Fermi gamma-ray source 1FGL J1040.5+0616 which is formally 0.8' away, to XMM-Newton X-ray source 2XMM J104031.5+061721 and to the radio source 87GB 103758.5+063247. The following infrared magnitudes were measured by 2MASS on 2000 Feb. 29: J=16.98+/-0.19, H=16.41+/-0.24, K=15.28+/-0.21 (2MASS 10403161+0617218).

Another activity episode was observed by the NEAT project in May 2001 when the object became ~2.5m brighter than in Feb. 1998. Comparison of 1998 and 2001 NEAT images is uploaded to http://master.sai.msu.ru/static/OT/J104031+061721-NEAT.jpg

Multi-wavelength follow up observations are strongly encouraged. MASTER discovery and reference images are available at: http://master.sai.msu.ru/static/OT/104031.63061721.8.png

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