Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
IAUC 6721: GRB 970815
The following International Astronomical Union Circular may be linked-to from your own Web pages, but must not otherwise be redistributed (see these notes on the conditions under which circulars are made available on our WWW site).
Read IAUC 6722
.dvi or
.ps format.
Circular No. 6721
Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION
Mailstop 18, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.
IAUSUBS@CFA.HARVARD.EDU or FAX 617-495-7231 (subscriptions)
BMARSDEN@CFA.HARVARD.EDU or DGREEN@CFA.HARVARD.EDU (science)
URL http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/cfa/ps/cbat.html
Phone 617-495-7244/7440/7444 (for emergency use only)
GRB 970815
T. E. Harrison, B. J. McNamara, J. J. Johnson, and P. A. Mason,
New Mexico State University; D. D. Balam, University of Victoria;
and A. R. Klemola, Lick Observatory, report: "We have used the
infrared camera (GRIM II) on the Astrophysical Research Consortium
3.5-m telescope to image the central 6' x 6' of the RXTE ASM error
box for GRB 970815 (IAUC 6718), and the 1.82-m Plaskett telescope
of the National Research Council of Canada to obtain deep R-band
(limiting R = 23) images of a 10' x 10' field centered on the ASM
burst position. The first J-band image mosaic was obtained on Aug.
16.27 UT. The second mosaic was made on Aug. 17.39. In the 24 hr
between mosaics, no sources showed significant variability. R-band
images were obtained on Aug. 16.21, 16.32, 18.25, and 19.22. No
new sources or highly-variable objects were identified. Comparison
of the J- and R-band images reveals two objects with interesting
R-J colors. The first of these is a blue object at R.A. =
16h10m03s.6, Decl. = +81o32'35".3 (equinox 2000.0), and the second
is a red source located at position end figures 00s.5, 42".5.
Neither source exhibited measurable variability. Additionally, we
have identified a peculiar POSS object at position end figures
21s.0, 31'43".0. This object is visible on the POSS E-775 plate,
but not on the E-1363 plate or on either of the O plates; it is
also not present in our J or R images. The peculiar POSS object
does not appear to be a plate flaw."
K. Z. Stanek, D. D. Sasselov, and M. R. Garcia, Harvard-
Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics; and C. R. Robinson,
Universities Space Research Association and Marshall Space Flight
Center, communicate: "Analysis of images centered on the error box
of the x-ray counterpart to GRB 970815 (IAUC 6718) show no
significantly variable objects to a magnitude limit of R = 21. The
variability for the 200 point sources in the field with 15.5 < R <
21 is rms < 0.2 mag. The images were obtained with the 1.2-m
telescope of the F. L. Whipple Observatory on Aug. 16.31, 17.16,
17.22, 19.12, 19.19, 19.31, and 20.12 UT in the Cousins R filter.
The images cover a 11' x 11' area and are available as FITS files
by anonymous ftp at cfa-ftp.harvard.edu, in pub/kstanek/GRB970815,
or through the WWW at http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/~kstanek/. Visual
inspection of the images obtained by D. D. Balam (see item above)
confirms this conclusion. These images are available as FITS files
by anonymous ftp at astroftp.phys.uvic.ca, in /pub/balam/RXTE6335."
(C) Copyright 1997 CBAT
1997 August 22 (6721) Daniel W. E. Green
Read IAUC 6722
.dvi or
.ps format.
Our Web policy. Index to the CBAT/MPC/ICQ pages.
