(cba:news) OT J020804.2+373217 = Catalina transient

[Joe Patterson]

Dear CBAers,

Two objects - at least - have become really star attractions in the 
night sky.  One is this new transient described below (and in the CSS 
data).  At 15th magnitude and with fast, large amplitude variations, it 
will surely be a fascinating target - and likely a star of great 
astrophysical interest.

The new dwarf nova in Pisces is also a winner.  The periodic signals 
seem now to have mutated into common superhumps.  Though "common", 
they're of large amplitude and - if covered extensively by our 
time-series photometry - will convey a lot of information about the 
structure of the accretion disks.

It would also be mighty nice to know if FS Aur has finally, after all 
these years of false alarms and inexplicable periods, managed to stage 
an actual superoutburst.  There have been threats, but none have panned 
out.  It did rise to 14th magnitude a few days ago - what about now?

As for priorities, I'd give CSS0208 and the Pisces dwarf nova pretty 
much the highest possible rating.  Fire away unfiltered - best to 
maximize signal-to-noise on these guys.  If still bright, FS Aur is 
mighty interesting too; but it has disappointed many times, so there's 
some burden of proof there.

The American Astronomical Society and AAVSO will be having a joint 
meeting in Boston during May 22-26, 2011.  This is to give you early 
warning that we'll have a CBA meeting coincident with that too (rather 
than at SAS in California).  I hope this can attract some of our 
European members.  More details later... but I strongly encourage 
non-AAVSO members to first join the AAVSO.  This will get you a much
lower registration fee for the AAS meeting... and we'd fit in well with 
the AAVSOers anyway.  So - that makes it official.

joe





OT J020804.2+373217 = Catalina transient

    CRTS detected (=CSS101207:020804+373217) a potentially interesting
outbursting object.  Has an X-ray counterpart and relatively large
intranight variation.  A blue object in quiescence.

1012071380104223832 2010-12-07T05:50:59 2010-12-07T05:32:57 02 08 04.23 
+37 32 16.6 15.08 15.34 15.34 15.47 
http://nesssi.cacr.caltech.edu/catalina/20101207/1012071380104223832.html

020802.5 +373235 (2000.0) 1RXS-F_J020802.6+373236 0.030 1.00 0.06