J/A+A/559/A20 Historical outbursts of OJ287 (Hudec+, 2013)
The historical 1900 and 1913 outbursts of the binary blazar candidate OJ287.
Hudec R., Basta M., Pihajoki P., Valtonen M.
<Astron. Astrophys. 559, A20 (2013)>
=2013A&A...559A..20H 2013A&A...559A..20H
ADC_Keywords: BL Lac objects ; Photometry
Keywords: quasars: individual: OJ287 - methods: observational -
techniques: photometric - black hole physics -
BL Lacertae objects: individual: OJ287
Abstract:
We report on historical optical outbursts in the OJ287 system in 1900
and 1913, detected on archival astronomical plates of the Harvard
College Observatory. The 1900 outburst is reported for the first time.
The first recorded outburst of the periodically active quasar OJ287
described before was observed in 1913. Up to now the information on
this event was based on three points from plate archives. We used the
Harvard plate collection, and added another seven observations to the
light curve. The light curve is now well covered and allows one to
determine the beginning of the outburst quite accurately. The outburst
was longer and more energetic than the standard 1983 outburst. Should
the system be strictly periodic, the period determined from these two
outbursts would be 11.665yr. However, this does not match the 1900
outburst or other prominent outbursts in the record. On the other
hand, the precessing binary black hole model of Lehto and Valtonen
(1996ApJ...460..207L 1996ApJ...460..207L) can explain these and other known outbursts in
OJ287. Finally, we discuss the upper limits for the expected 1906
outburst and the 1910 outburst, which was observed.
Objects:
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RA (2000) DE Designation(s)
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08 54 48.87 +20 06 30.6 OJ287 = QSO J0854+2006
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File Summary:
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FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
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ReadMe 80 . This file
table2.dat 24 574 Magnitude estimates from HCO sky patrol plates
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See also:
J/A+AS/129/569 : BVRI photometry of OJ 287 (Jia Guibin+ 1998)
J/AJ/132/1256 : eim BATC photometry of OJ 287 (Wu+, 2006)
J/AJ/141/65 : BATC ceimo light curves of OJ 287 (Dai+, 2011)
J/MNRAS/385/823 : UBVRI light curves of OJ 287 (Zheng+, 2008)
J/MNRAS/402/2087 : Optical polarization of OJ 287 in 2005-09 (Villforth+, 2010)
J/MNRAS/421/1861 : OJ 287 polarization and VLBI jet direction (Valtonen+, 2012)
Byte-by-byte Description of file: table2.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 11 F11.3 d JD Julian date
13- 16 A4 --- Qual Plate quality (1)
19 A1 --- l_Bmag Limit flag on Bmag
20- 24 F5.2 mag Bmag ?=-1 B-band magnitude
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Note (1): Quality codes as follows:
k/d = bad
k/dd = very bad
k/n = good
k/nn = very good
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Acknowledgements:
Rene Hudec, rene.hudec (at)gmail.com
(End) Patricia Vannier [CDS] 16-Aug-2013