Search

We report spectroscopic and photometric follow-up of a dormant black hole (BH) candidate from Gaia DR3. The system, which we call Gaia BH2, contains a $\sim 1M_{\odot}$ red giant and a dark companion with mass $M_2 = 8.9\pm 0.3\,M_{\odot}$ that is very likely a BH. The orbital period, $P_{\rm orb} = 1277$ days, is much longer than that of any previously studied BH binary. Our radial velocity (RV) follow-up over a 7-month period spans more than 90% of the orbit's dynamic range in RV and is in excellent agreement with predictions of the Gaia solution. UV imaging and high-resolution optical spectra rule out all plausible luminous companions that could explain the orbit. The star is a bright ($G=12.3$), slightly metal-poor ($\rm [Fe/H]=-0.22$) low-luminosity giant ($T_{\rm eff}=4600\,\rm K$; $R = 7.8\,R_{\odot}$; $\log\left[g/\left({\rm cm\,s^{-2}}\right)\right] = 2.6$). The binary's orbit is moderately eccentric ($e=0.52$). The giant is strongly enhanced in $\alpha-$elements, with $\rm [\alpha/Fe] = +0.26$, but the system's Galactocentric orbit is typical of the thin disk. We obtained X-ray and radio nondetections of the source near periastron, which support BH accretion models in which the net accretion rate at the horizon is much lower than the Bondi-Hoyle-Lyttleton rate. At a distance of 1.16 kpc, Gaia BH2 is the second-nearest known BH, after Gaia BH1. Its orbit -- like that of Gaia BH1 -- seems too wide to have formed through common envelope evolution. Gaia BH1 and BH2 have orbital periods at opposite edges of the Gaia DR3 sensitivity curve, perhaps hinting at a bimodal intrinsic period distribution for wide BH binaries. Dormant BH binaries like Gaia BH1 and Gaia BH2 likely significantly outnumber their close, X-ray bright cousins, but their formation pathways remain uncertain., Comment: Accepted to MNRAS

We constrain the orbital period ($P_{\rm orb}$) distribution of low-mass detached main-sequence eclipsing binaries (EBs) with light curves from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), which provides a well-understood selection function and sensitivity to faint stars. At short periods ($P_{\rm orb}\lesssim 2$ days), binaries are predicted to evolve significantly due to magnetic braking (MB), which shrinks orbits and ultimately brings detached binaries into contact. The period distribution is thus a sensitive probe of MB. We find that the intrinsic period distribution of low-mass ($0.1\lesssim M_1/M_{\odot} < 0.9$) binaries is basically flat (${\rm d}N/{\rm d}P_{\rm orb} \propto P_{\rm orb}^0$), from $P_{\rm orb}=10$ days down to the contact limit. This is strongly inconsistent with predictions of classical MB models based on the Skumanich relation, which are widely used in binary evolution calculations and predict ${\rm d}N/{\rm d}P_{\rm orb} \propto P_{\rm orb}^{7/3}$ at short periods. The observed distributions are best reproduced by models in which the magnetic field saturates at short periods, with a MB torque that scales roughly as $\dot{J}\propto P_{\rm orb}^{-1}$, as opposed to $\dot{J} \propto P_{\rm orb}^{-3}$ in the standard Skumanich law. We also find no significant difference between the period distributions of binaries containing fully and partially convective stars. Our results confirm that a saturated MB law, which was previously found to describe the spin-down of rapidly rotating isolated M dwarfs, also operates in tidally locked binaries. We advocate using saturated MB models in binary evolution calculations. Our work supports previous suggestions that MB in cataclysmic variables (CVs) is much weaker than assumed in the standard evolutionary model, unless mass transfer leads to significant additional angular momentum loss in CVs., Table 1 included in source files. Accepted to MNRAS

NGC 2004 #115 is a recently identified black hole (BH) candidate in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) containing a B star orbiting an unseen companion in a 2.9 day orbit and Be star tertiary. We show that the unseen companion is not a $25\,M_{\odot}$ BH, but a $(2-3)\,M_{\odot}$ luminous star. Analyzing the OGLE and MACHO light curves of the system, we detect ellipsoidal variability with amplitude 10 times larger than would be expected if the companion were a $25\,M_{\odot}$ BH, ruling out the low inclination required for a massive companion. The light curve also shows a clear reflection effect that is well-modeled with a $2.5\,M_{\odot}$ main-sequence secondary, ruling out a lower-mass BH or neutron star companion. We consider and reject models in which the system is a binary containing a stripped star orbiting the Be star: only a triple model with an outer Be star can explain both the observed light curve and radial velocities. Our results imply that the B star, whose slow projected rotation velocity and presumed tidal synchronization were interpreted as evidence for a low inclination (and thus a high companion mass), is far from being tidally synchronized: despite being in a 2.9 day orbit that is fully or nearly circularized ($e < 0.04$), its surface rotation period appears to be at least 20 days. We offer cautionary notes on the interpretation of dormant BH candidates in binaries., Accepted to MNRAS

Accreting magnetic white dwarfs offer an opportunity to understand the interplay between spin-up and spin-down torques in binary systems. Monitoring of the white dwarf spin may reveal whether the white dwarf spin is currently in a state of near-equilibrium, or of uni-directional evolution towards longer or shorter periods, reflecting the recent history of the system and providing constraints for evolutionary models. This makes the monitoring of the spin history of magnetic white dwarfs of high interest. In this paper we report the results of a campaign of follow-up optical photometry to detect and track the 39 sec white dwarf spin pulses recently discovered in Hubble Space Telescope data of the cataclysmic variable V1460 Her. We find the spin pulsations to be present in g-band photometry at a typical amplitude of 0.4%. Under favourable observing conditions, the spin signal is detectable using 2-meter class telescopes. We measured pulse-arrival times for all our observations, which allowed us to derive a precise ephemeris for the white dwarf spin. We have also derived an orbital modulation correction that can be applied to the measurements. With our limited baseline of just over four years, we detect no evidence yet for spin-up or spin-down of the white dwarf, obtaining a lower limit of |P/Pdot|> 4e7 years, which is already 4 to 8 times longer than the timescales measured in two other cataclysmic variable systems containing rapidly rotating white dwarfs, AE Aqr and AR Sco., 8 pages, 6 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

AM CVn systems are ultra-compact, helium-rich, accreting binaries with degenerate or semi-degenerate donors. We report the discovery of five new eclipsing AM CVn systems with orbital periods of 61.5, 55.5, 53.3, 37.4, and 35.4 minutes. These systems were discovered by searching for deep eclipses in the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) lightcurves of white dwarfs selected using Gaia parallaxes. We obtained phase-resolved spectroscopy to confirm that all systems are AM CVn binaries, and we obtained high-speed photometry to confirm the eclipse and characterize the systems. The spectra of two long-period systems (61.5 and 53.3 minutes) show many emission and absorption lines, indicating the presence of N, O, Na, Mg, Si, and Ca, and also the K and Zn, elements which have never been detected in AM CVn systems before. By modelling the high-speed photometry, we measured the mass and radius of the donor star, potentially constraining the evolutionary channel that formed these AM CVn systems. We determined that the average mass of the accreting white dwarf is $\approx0.8$$\mathrm{M_{\odot}}$, and that the white dwarfs in long-period systems are hotter than predicted by recently updated theoretical models. The donors have a high entropy and are a factor of $\approx$ 2 more massive compared to zero-entropy donors at the same orbital period. The large donor radius is most consistent with He-star progenitors, although the observed spectral features seem to contradict this. The discovery of 5 new eclipsing AM~CVn systems is consistent with the known observed AM CVn space density and estimated ZTF recovery efficiency. Based on this estimate, we expect to find another 1--4 eclipsing AM CVn systems as ZTF continues to obtain data. This will further increase our understanding of the population, but will require high precision data to better characterize these 5 systems and any new discoveries., Comment: submitted to MNRAS

The current generation of all-sky surveys is rapidly expanding our ability to study variable and transient sources. These surveys, with a variety of sensitivities, cadences, and fields of view, probe many ranges of time-scale and magnitude. Data from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) yields an opportunity to find variables on time-scales from minutes to months. In this paper, we present the codebase, ztfperiodic, and the computational metrics employed for the catalogue based on ZTF’s Second Data Release. We describe the publicly available, graphical-process-unit optimized period-finding algorithms employed, and highlight the benefit of existing and future graphical-process-unit clusters. We show how generating metrics as input to catalogues of this scale is possible for future ZTF data releases. Further work will be needed for future data from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time.

Over a dozen millisecond pulsars are ablating low-mass companions in close binary systems. In the original "black widow", the 8-hour orbital period eclipsing pulsar PSR J1959+2048 (PSR B1957+20), high energy emission originating from the pulsar is irradiating and may eventually destroy a low-mass companion. These systems are not only physical laboratories that reveal the dramatic result of exposing a close companion star to the relativistic energy output of a pulsar, but are also believed to harbour some of the most massive neutron stars, allowing for robust tests of the neutron star equation of state. Here, we report observations of ZTF J1406+1222, a wide hierarchical triple hosting a 62-minute orbital period black widow candidate whose optical flux varies by a factor of more than 10. ZTF J1406+1222 pushes the boundaries of evolutionary models, falling below the 80 minute minimum orbital period of hydrogen-rich systems. The wide tertiary companion is a rare low metallicity cool subdwarf star, and the system has a Galactic halo orbit consistent with passing near the Galactic center, making it a probe of formation channels, neutron star kick physics, and binary evolution., 63 pages, 15 figures, 2 tables, published in Nature on May 4, 2022

Of more than a thousand known cataclysmic variables (CVs), where a white dwarf is accreting from a hydrogen-rich star, only a dozen have orbital periods below 75 minutes

We report discovery of a bright, nearby ($G = 13.8;\,\,d = 480\,\rm pc$) Sun-like star orbiting a dark object. We identified the system as a black hole candidate via its astrometric orbital solution from the Gaia mission. Radial velocities validated and refined the Gaia solution, and spectroscopy ruled out significant light contributions from another star. Joint modeling of radial velocities and astrometry constrains the companion mass to $M_2 = 9.62\pm 0.18\,M_{\odot}$. The spectroscopic orbit alone sets a minimum companion mass of $M_2>5\,M_{\odot}$; if the companion were a $5\,M_{\odot}$ star, it would be $500$ times more luminous than the entire system. These constraints are insensitive to the mass of the luminous star, which appears as a slowly-rotating G dwarf ($T_{\rm eff}=5850\,\rm K$, $\log g = 4.5$, $M=0.93\,M_{\odot}$), with near-solar metallicity ($\rm [Fe/H] = -0.2$) and an unremarkable abundance pattern. We find no plausible astrophysical scenario that can explain the orbit and does not involve a black hole. The orbital period, $P_{\rm orb}=185.6$ days, is longer than that of any known stellar-mass black hole binary. The system's modest eccentricity ($e=0.45$), high metallicity, and thin-disk Galactic orbit suggest that it was born in the Milky Way disk with at most a weak natal kick. How the system formed is uncertain. Common envelope evolution can only produce the system's wide orbit under extreme and likely unphysical assumptions. Formation models involving triples or dynamical assembly in an open cluster may be more promising. This is the nearest known black hole by a factor of 3, and its discovery suggests the existence of a sizable population of dormant black holes in binaries. Future Gaia releases will likely facilitate the discovery of dozens more., 30 pages, 15 figures, 1-2 black holes. Accepted to MNRAS

We present a catalogue of white dwarf candidates selected from Gaia early data release three (EDR3). We applied several selection criteria in absolute magnitude, colour, and Gaia quality flags to remove objects with unreliable measurements while preserving most stars compatible with the white dwarf locus in the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram. We then used a sample of over 30 000 spectroscopically confirmed white dwarfs and contaminants from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) to map the distribution of these objects in the Gaia absolute magnitude-colour space. Finally, we adopt the same method presented in our previous Gaia DR2 work to calculate a probability of being a white dwarf (Pwd) for $\simeq$1.3 million sources which passed our quality selection. The Pwd values can be used to select a sample of $\simeq$359 000 high-confidence white dwarf candidates in the magnitude range 8< G 7000K, at high Galactic latitudes (|b|>20��). Alongside the main catalogue we include a reduced-proper-motion extension containing $\simeq$10 200 white dwarf candidates with unreliable parallax measurements which could, however be identified on the basis of their proper motion. We also performed a cross-match of our catalogues with SDSS DR16 spectroscopy and provide spectral classification based on visual inspection for all resulting matches., Minor text revisions. 20 pages,14 figures. Accepted in MNRAS. Catalogues can be downloaded at https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/physics/research/astro/research/catalogues/gaiaedr3_wd_main.fits.gz ; https://warwick.ac.uk//fac/sci/physics/research/astro/research/catalogues/gaiaedr3_wd_rpm_ext.fits.gz ; https://warwick.ac.uk//fac/sci/physics/research/astro/research/catalogues/gaiaedr3_wd_sdssspec.fits.gz

We show that the radial velocity-variable star in the black hole candidate NGC 1850 BH1 cannot be a normal $\approx 5\,M_{\odot}$ subgiant, as was proposed, but is an overluminous stripped-envelope star with mass $\approx 1 M_{\odot}$. The result follows directly from the star's observed radius and the orbital period -- density relation for Roche lobe-filling stars: the star's density, as constrained by the observed ellipsoidal variability, is too low for its mass to exceed $\approx 1.5\,M_{\odot}$. This lower mass significantly reduces the implied mass of the unseen companion and qualitative interpretation of the system, such that a normal main-sequence companion with mass $(2.5-5)\,M_{\odot}$ is fully consistent with the data. We explore evolutionary scenarios that could produce the binary using MESA and find that its properties can be matched by models in which a $\sim5\,M_{\odot}$ primary loses most of its envelope to a companion and is observed in a bloated state before contracting to become a core helium burning sdOB star. This is similar to the scenario proposed to explain the binaries LB-1 and HR 6819. Though it likely does not contain a black hole, NGC 1850 BH1 provides an interesting test case for binary evolution models, particularly given its membership in a cluster of known age., 5 pages, 3 figures. Accepted to MNRAS Letters

AT2019wey (SRGA J043520.9+552226, SRGE J043523.3+552234) is a transient first reported by the ATLAS optical survey in 2019 December. It rose to prominence upon detection, three months later, by the Spektrum-Roentgen-Gamma (SRG) mission in its first all-sky survey. X-ray observations reported in Yao et al. suggest that AT2019wey is a Galactic low-mass X-ray binary (LMXB) with a black hole (BH) or neutron star (NS) accretor. Here we present ultraviolet, optical, near-infrared, and radio observations of this object. We show that the companion is a short-period (P < 16 hr) low-mass (< 1 Msun) star. We consider AT2019wey to be a candidate BH system since its locations on the L_radio--L_X and L_opt--L_X diagrams are closer to BH binaries than NS binaries. We demonstrate that from 2020 June to August, despite the more than 10 times brightening at radio and X-ray wavelengths, the optical luminosity of AT2019wey only increased by 1.3--1.4 times. We interpret the UV/optical emission before the brightening as thermal emission from a truncated disk in a hot accretion flow and the UV/optical emission after the brightening as reprocessing of the X-ray emission in the outer accretion disk. AT2019wey demonstrates that combining current wide-field optical surveys and SRG provides a way to discover the emerging population of short-period BH LMXB systems with faint X-ray outbursts., Accepted by ApJ

White dwarfs represent the last stage of evolution of stars with mass less than about eight times that of the Sun and, like other stars, are often found in binaries. If the orbital period of the binary is short enough, energy losses from gravitational-wave radiation can shrink the orbit until the two white dwarfs come into contact and merge. Depending on the component masses, the merger can lead to a supernova of type Ia or result in a massive white dwarf. In the latter case, the white dwarf remnant is expected to be highly magnetised because of the strong magnetic dynamo that should arise during the merger, and be rapidly spinning from the conservation of the orbital angular momentum. Here we report observations of a white dwarf, ZTF J190132.9+145808.7, that exhibits these properties, but to an extreme: a rotation period of 6.94 minutes, a magnetic field ranging between 600 megagauss and 900 megagauss over its surface, and a stellar radius of about 2,100 km, slightly larger than the radius of the Moon. Such a small radius implies that the star's mass is close to the maximum white-dwarf mass, or Chandrasekhar mass. ZTF J190132.9+145808.7 is likely to be cooling through the Urca processes (neutrino emission from electron capture on sodium) because of the high densities reached in its core., Comment: 37 pages, 9 figures, published in Nature on June 30, 2021

AM CVn systems are a rare type of accreting binary that consists of a white dwarf and a helium-rich, degenerate donor star. Using the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), we searched for new AM CVn systems by focusing on blue, outbursting stars. We first selected outbursting stars using the ZTF alerts. We cross-matched the candidates with $Gaia$ and Pan-STARRS catalogs. The initial selection of candidates based on the $Gaia$ $BP$-$RP$ contains 1751 unknown objects. We used the Pan-STARRS $g$-$r$ and $r$-$i$ color in combination with the $Gaia$ color to identify 59 high-priority candidates. We obtained identification spectra of 35 sources, of which 18 are high priority candidates, and discovered 9 new AM CVn systems and one magnetic CV which shows only He-II lines. Using the outburst recurrence time, we estimate the orbital periods which are in the range of 29 to 50 minutes. We conclude that targeted followup of blue, outbursting sources is an efficient method to find new AM CVn systems, and we plan to followup all candidates we identified to systematically study the population of outbursting AM CVn systems., Submitted, comments and feedback welcome

Spectroscopic detection of narrow emission lines traces the presence of circumstellar mass distributions around massive stars exploding as core-collapse supernovae. Transient emission lines disappearing shortly after the supernova explosion suggest that the material spatial extent is compact and implies an increased mass loss shortly prior to explosion. Here, we present a systematic survey for such transient emission lines (Flash Spectroscopy) among Type II supernovae detected in the first year of the Zwicky Transient Facility survey. We find that at least six out of ten events for which a spectrum was obtained within two days of the estimated explosion time show evidence for such transient flash lines. Our measured flash event fraction (>30% at 95% confidence level) indicates that elevated mass loss is a common process occurring in massive stars that are about to explode as supernovae.

We observed Episodically Active Asteroid (6478) Gault in 2020 with multiple telescopes in Asia and North America and have found that it is no longer active after its recent outbursts at the end of 2018 and start of 2019. The inactivity during this apparation allowed us to measure the absolute magnitude of Gault of H_r = 14.63 +/- 0.02, G_r = 0.21 +/- 0.02 from our secular phasecurve observations. In addition, we were able to constrain Gault's rotation period using time-series photometric lightcurves taken over 17 hours on multiple days in 2020 August, September and October. The photometric lightcurves have a repeating $\lesssim$0.05 magnitude feature suggesting that (6478) Gault has a rotation period of ~2.5 hours and may have a semi-spherical or top-like shape, much like Near-Earth Asteroids Ryugu and Bennu. The rotation period of ~2.5 hours is near to the expected critical rotation period for an asteroid with the physical properties of (6478) Gault suggesting that its activity observed over multiple epochs is due to surface mass shedding from its fast rotation spun up by the Yarkovsky-O'Keefe-Radzievskii-Paddack effect., Comment: 23 pages, 18 figures; Accepted by ApJ Letters

Luminous Red Novae (LRNe) are astrophysical transients associated with the partial ejection of a binary system's common envelope (CE) shortly before its merger. Here we present the results of our photometric and spectroscopic follow-up campaign of AT2018bwo (DLT18x), a LRN discovered in NGC45, and investigate its progenitor system using binary stellar-evolution models. The transient reached a peak magnitude of $M_r=-10.97\pm0.11$ and maintained this brightness during its optical plateau of $t_p = 41\pm5$days. During this phase, it showed a rather stable photospheric temperature of ~3300K and a luminosity of ~$10^{40}$erg/s. The photosphere of AT2018bwo at early times appeared larger and cooler than other similar LRNe, likely due to an extended mass-loss episode before the merger. Towards the end of the plateau, optical spectra showed a reddened continuum with strong molecular absorption bands. The reprocessed emission by the cooling dust was also detected in the mid-infrared bands ~1.5 years after the outburst. Archival Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescope data taken 10-14 years before the transient event suggest a progenitor star with $T_{prog}\sim 6500$K, $R_{prog}\sim 100R_{\odot}$ and $L_{prog}\sim 2\times10^4L_{\odot}$, and an upper limit for optically thin warm (1000 K) dust mass of $M_d, Comment: 21 pages, 16 figures, accepted version for A&A

The Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) has been observing the entire northern sky since the start of 2018 down to a magnitude of 20.5 (5σ for 30 s exposure) in the g, r, and i filters. Over the course of two years, ZTF has obtained light curves of more than a billion sources, each with 50–1000 epochs per light curve in g and r, and fewer in i. To be able to use the information contained in the light curves of variable sources for new scientific discoveries, an efficient and flexible framework is needed to classify them. In this paper, we introduce the methods and infrastructure that will be used to classify all ZTF light curves. Our approach aims to be flexible and modular and allows the use of a dynamical classification scheme and labels, continuously evolving training sets, and the use of different machine-learning classifier types and architectures. With this setup, we are able to continuously update and improve the classification of ZTF light curves as new data become available, training samples are updated, and new classes need to be incorporated.

Using photometry collected with the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), we are conducting an ongoing survey for binary systems with short orbital periods ($P_{\rm b}, 32 pages, 12 figures, 7 tables, submitted to ApJ

White dwarfs represent the last stage of evolution for low and intermediate-mass stars (below about 8 times the mass of our Sun), and like their stellar progenitors, they are often found in binaries. If the orbital period of the binary is short enough, energy losses from gravitational wave radiation can shrink the orbit until the two white dwarfs come into contact and merge. Depending on the masses of the coalescing white dwarfs, the merger can lead to a supernova of type Ia, or it can give birth to a massive white dwarf. In the latter case, the white dwarf remnant is expected to be highly magnetised due to the strong dynamo that may arise during the merger, and rapidly rotating due to conservation of the orbital angular momentum of the binary. Here we report the discovery of a white dwarf, ZTF J190132.9+145808.7, which presents all these properties, but to an extreme: a rotation period of 6.94 minutes, one of the shortest measured for an isolated white dwarf, a magnetic field ranging between 600 MG and 900 MG over its surface, one of the highest fields ever detected on a white dwarf, and a stellar radius of 1810 km, slightly larger than the radius of the Moon. Such a small radius implies the star's mass is the closest ever detected to the white dwarf maximum mass, or Chandrasekhar mass. In fact, as the white dwarf cools and its composition stratifies, it may become unstable and collapse due to electron capture, exploding into a thermonuclear supernova or collapsing into a neutron star. Neutron stars born in this fashion could account for 10% of their total population.

White dwarfs represent the last stage of evolution of stars with mass less than about eight times that of the Sun and, like other stars, are often found in binaries

Context. Systematic theoretical calculations of Doppler beaming factors are scarce in the literature, particularly in the case of white dwarfs. Additionally, there are no specific calculations for the limb-darkening coefficients of 3D white dwarf models. Aims. The objective of this research is to provide the astronomical community with Doppler beaming calculations for a wide range of effective temperatures, local gravities, and hydrogen/metal content for white dwarfs as well as stars on both the main sequence and the giant branch. In addition, we present the theoretical calculations of the limb-darkening coefficients for 3D white dwarf models for the first time. Methods. We computed Doppler beaming factors for DA, DB, and DBA white dwarf models, as well as for main sequence and giant stars covering the transmission curves of the Sloan, UBVRI, HiPERCAM, Kepler, TESS, and Gaia photometric systems. The calculations of the limb-darkening coefficients for 3D models were carried out using the least-squares method for these photometric systems. Results. The input physics of the white dwarf models for which we have computed the Doppler beaming factors are: chemical compositions log [H/He] = -10.0 (DB), -2.0 (DBA), and He/H = 0 (DA), with log g varying between 5.0 and 9.5 and effective temperatures in the range 3750-100 000 K. The beaming factors were also calculated assuming non-local thermodynamic equilibrium for the case of DA white dwarfs with Teff > 40 000 K. For the mixing-length parameters, we adopted ML2/α = 0.8 (DA case) and 1.25 (DB and DBA). The Doppler beaming factors for main sequence and giant stars were computed using the ATLAS9 version, characterized by metallicities ranging from [-2.5, 0.2] solar abundances, with log g varying between 0 and 5.0 and effective temperatures between 3500 and 50 000 K. The adopted microturbulent velocity for these models was 2.0 km s-1. The limb-darkening coefficients were computed for three-dimensional DA and DB white dwarf models calculated with the CO5BOLD radiation-hydrodynamics code. The parameter range covered by the three-dimensional DA models spans log g values between 7.0 and 9.0 and Teff between 6000 and 15 000 K, while He/H = 0. The three-dimensional DB models cover a similar parameter range of log g between 7.5 and 9.0 and Teff between 12 000 and 34 000 K, while logH/He = -10.0. We adopted six laws for the computation of the limb-darkening coefficients: linear, quadratic, square root, logarithmic, power-2, and a general one with four coefficients. Conclusions. The beaming factor calculations, which use realistic models of stellar atmospheres, show that the black body approximation is not accurate, particularly for the filters u, u′, U, g, g′, and B. The black body approach is only valid for high effective temperatures and/or long effective wavelengths. Therefore, for more accurate analyses of light curves, we recommend the use of the beaming factors presented in this paper. Concerning limb-darkening, the distribution of specific intensities for 3D models indicates that, in general, these models are less bright toward the limb than their 1D counterparts, which implies steeper profiles. To describe these intensities better, we recommend the use of the four-term law (also for 1D models) given the level of precision that is being achieved with Earth-based instruments and space missions such as Kepler and TESS (and PLATO in the future). © ESO 2020., The Spanish MEC (ESP2017-87676-C5-2-R, PID2019-107061GB-C64, and PID2019-109522GB-C52) is gratefully acknowledged for its support during the development of this work. A. C. also acknowledges financial support from the State Agency for Research of the Spanish MCIU through the “Center of Excellence Severo Ochoa” award for the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (SEV-2017-0709). The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme n. 677706 (WD3D). SGP acknowledges the support of a Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) Ernest Rutherford Fellowship. This research has made use of the SIMBAD database, operated at the CDS, Strasbourg, France, and of NASA’s Astrophysics Data System Abstract Service.

We present time-resolved visible spectrophotometry of 2020 CD₃, the second known minimoon. The spectrophotometry was taken with the Keck I/Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer between wavelengths 434 and 912 nm in the B, g, V, R, I, and RG850 filters as it was leaving the Earth–Moon system on 2020 March 23 UTC. The spectrum of 2020 CD₃ resembles V-type asteroids and some lunar rock samples with a 434–761 nm reddish slope of ~18%/100 nm (g–r = 0.62 ± 0.08 and r–i = 0.21 ± 0.06) with an absorption band at ~900 nm corresponding to i–z = −0.54 ± 0.10. Combining our measured H of 31.9 ± 0.1 with an albedo of 0.35 typical for V-type asteroids, we determine 2020 CD₃'s diameter to be ~0.9 ± 0.1 m, making it the first minimoon and one of the smallest asteroids to be spectrally studied. We use our time-series photometry to detect significant periodic light-curve variations with a period of ~573 s and amplitude of ~1. In addition, we extend the observational arc of 2020 CD₃ to 37 days, to 2020 March 23 UTC. From the improved orbital solution for 2020 CD₃, we estimate the likely duration of its capture to be ~2 yr and the nongravitational perturbation on its orbit due to radiation pressure with an area-to-mass ratio of (6.9 ± 2.4) × 10⁻⁴ m² kg⁻¹ implying a density of 2.3 ± 0.8 g cm⁻³, broadly compatible with other meter-scale asteroids and lunar rock. We searched for prediscovery detections of 2020 CD₃ in the Zwicky Transient Facility archive as far back as 2018 October but were unable to locate any positive detections.

We present a survey of the early evolution of 12 Type IIn supernovae (SNe IIn) in the Ultra-Violet (UV) and visible light. We use this survey to constrain the geometry of the circumstellar material (CSM) surrounding SN IIn explosions, which may shed light on their progenitor diversity. In order to distinguish between aspherical and spherical circumstellar material (CSM), we estimate the blackbody radius temporal evolution of the SNe IIn of our sample, following the method introduced by Soumagnac et al. We find that higher luminosity objects tend to show evidence for aspherical CSM. Depending on whether this correlation is due to physical reasons or to some selection bias, we derive a lower limit between 35% and 66% on the fraction of SNe IIn showing evidence for aspherical CSM. This result suggests that asphericity of the CSM surrounding SNe IIn is common - consistent with data from resolved images of stars undergoing considerable mass loss. It should be taken into account for more realistic modelling of these events., Comment: Submitted to ApJ. Comments are welcome

We report the first plausible optical electromagnetic (EM) counterpart to a (candidate) binary black hole (BBH) merger. Detected by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), the EM flare is consistent with expectations for a kicked BBH merger in the accretion disk of an active galactic nucleus (AGN), and is unlikely ($, Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters (June 25, 2020)

Many inspiraling and merging stellar remnants emit both gravitational and electromagnetic radiation as they orbit or collide. These gravitational wave events together with their associated electromagnetic counterparts provide insight about the nature of the merger, allowing us to further constrain properties of the binary. With the future launch of the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), follow up observations and models are needed of ultracompact binary (UCB) systems. Current and upcoming long baseline time domain surveys will observe many of these UCBs. We present a new fast periodic object search tool capable of searching for generic periodic signals based on the Conditional Entropy algorithm. This new implementation allows for a grid search over both the period ($P$) and the time derivative of the period ($\dot{P}$). To demonstrate the usage of this tool, we use a small, hand-picked subset of a UCB population generated from the population synthesis code \cosmic, as well as a custom catalog for varying periods at fixed intrinsic parameters. We simulate light curves as likely to be observed by future time domain surveys by using an existing eclipsing binary light curve model accounting for the change in orbital period due to gravitational radiation. We find that a search with $\dot{P}$ values is necessary for detecting binaries at orbital periods less than $\sim$10 min. We also show it is useful in finding and characterizing binaries with longer periods, but at a higher computational cost. Our code is called gce (GPU-Accelerated Conditional Entropy). It is available at https://github.com/mikekatz04/gce., 15 pages, 7 figures

Using selection criteria based on amplitude, time and color, we have identified 329 objects as known or candidate cataclysmic variable (CVs) during the first year of testing and operation of the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF). Of these, 90 are previously confirmed CVs, 218 are strong candidates based on the shape and color of their light curves obtained during 3-562 days of observations, and the remaining 21 are possible CVs but with too few data points to be listed as good candidates. Almost half the strong candidates are within 10 deg of the galactic plane, in contrast to most other large surveys which have avoided crowded fields. The available Gaia parallaxes are consistent with sampling the low mass transfer CVs, as predicted by population models. Our followup spectra have confirmed Balmer/helium emission lines in 27 objects, with four showing high excitation HeII emission, including candidates for an AM CVn, a polar and an intermediate polar. Our results demonstrate that a complete survey of the galactic plane is needed to accomplish an accurate determination of the number of CVs existing in the Milky Way., 27 pages, 9 figures, 3 tables

The Zwicky Transient Facility has begun to discover binary systems with orbital periods that are less than 1 h. Combined with dedicated follow-up systems, which allow for high-cadence photometry of these sources, systematic confirmation and characterization of these sources are now possible. Here, we report the discovery of ZTF J190125.42+530929.5, a 40.6-min orbital period, eclipsing double white dwarf binary. Both photometric modelling and spectroscopic modelling confirm its nature, yielding an estimated inclination of $i = 86.2^{+0.6}_{-0.2}\, \rm deg$ and primary and secondary effective temperatures of $\textrm{{T}}_\textrm{eff} = 28\,000^{+500}_{-500}$ and $17\,600^{+400}_{-400}\, \mathrm{ K}$, respectively. This system adds to a growing list of sources for future gravitational-wave detectors and contributes to the demographic analysis of double degenerates.

In a search for eclipsing white dwarfs using the Zwicky Transient Facility lightcurves, we identified a deep eclipsing white dwarf with a dark, substellar companion. The lack of an infrared excess and an orbital period of 10 hours made this a potential exoplanet candidate. We obtained high-speed photometry and radial velocity measurements to characterize the system. The white dwarf has a mass of $0.50\pm0.02\,\mathrm{M_{\odot}}$ and a temperature of $10900\pm200\,$K. The companion has a mass of $0.059\pm0.004\,\mathrm{M_{\odot}}$ and a small radius of $0.0783\pm0.0013\,\mathrm{R_{\odot}}$. It is one of the smallest transiting brown dwarfs known and likely old, $\gtrsim 8\,$Gyr. The ZTF discovery efficiency of substellar objects transiting white dwarfs is limited by the number of epochs and as ZTF continues to collect data we expect to find more of these systems. This will allow us to measure period and mass distributions and allows us to understand the formation channels of white dwarfs with substellar companions., Comment: submitted, comments welcome

4FGL J0935.3+0901 is a gamma-ray source detected by the Large Area Telescope (LAT) onboard the Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope. We have conducted detailed analysis of the LAT data for this source and multi-wavelength studies of the source field. Its gamma-ray emission can be described with a power law ($\Gamma=2.0\pm0.2$) with an exponential cutoff ($E_c=2.9\pm1.6$ GeV), while the flux shows significant long-term variations. From analysis of archival Neil Gehrels Swift X-ray Telescope data, we find only one X-ray source in the LAT's 2$\sigma$ error region. Within a 3.7" radius error circle of the X-ray source, there is only one optical object down to $r'\sim$23 mag. Time-resolved photometry of the optical object indicates a likely 2.5~hr periodic modulation, while its spectrum shows double-peaked hydrogen and helium emission lines (similar to those seen in accretion discs in low-mass X-ray binaries). Combining these results, we conclude that we have discovered a compact X-ray emitting binary in likely association with 4FGL J0935.3+0901, i.e., a millisecond pulsar (MSP) binary. We discuss the implication of the optical spectral features: this binary could be a transitional MSP system at a sub-luminous disc state, although the other possibility, the binary in a rotation-powered state showing the optical emission lines due to intrabinary interaction processes, can not be excluded. Further observational studies will help determine detailed properties of this candidate MSP binary and thus clarify its current state., Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, 1 table, to appear in MNRAS

All authors: Kasliwal, Mansi M.; Anand, Shreya; Ahumada, Tomás; Stein, Robert; Carracedo, Ana Sagués; Andreoni, Igor; Coughlin, Michael W.; Singer, Leo P.; Kool, Erik C.; De, Kishalay; Kumar, Harsh; AlMualla, Mouza; Yao, Yuhan; Bulla, Mattia; Dobie, Dougal; Reusch, Simeon; Perley, Daniel A.; Cenko, S. Bradley; Bhalerao, Varun; Kaplan, David L.; Sollerman, Jesper; Goobar, Ariel; Copperwheat, Christopher M.; Bellm, Eric C.; Anupama, G. C.; Corsi, Alessandra; Nissanke, Samaya; Agudo, Iván; Bagdasaryan, Ashot; Barway, Sudhanshu; Belicki, Justin; Bloom, Joshua S.; Bolin, Bryce; Buckley, David A. H.; Burdge, Kevin B.; Burruss, Rick; Caballero-García, Maria D.; Cannella, Chris; Castro-Tirado, Alberto J.; Cook, David O.; Cooke, Jeff; Cunningham, Virginia; Dahiwale, Aishwarya; Deshmukh, Kunal; Dichiara, Simone; Duev, Dmitry A.; Dutta, Anirban; Feeney, Michael; Franckowiak, Anna; Frederick, Sara; Fremling, Christoffer; Gal-Yam, Avishay; Gatkine, Pradip; Ghosh, Shaon; Goldstein, Daniel A.; Golkhou, V. Zach; Graham, Matthew J.; Graham, Melissa L.; Hankins, Matthew J.; Helou, George; Hu, Youdong; Ip, Wing-Huen; Jaodand, Amruta; Karambelkar, Viraj; Kong, Albert K. H.; Kowalski, Marek; Khandagale, Maitreya; Kulkarni, S. R.; Kumar, Brajesh; Laher, Russ R.; Li, K. L.; Mahabal, Ashish; Masci, Frank J.; Miller, Adam A.; Mogotsi, Moses; Mohite, Siddharth; Mooley, Kunal; Mroz, Przemek; Newman, Jeffrey A.; Ngeow, Chow-Choong; Oates, Samantha R.; Patil, Atharva Sunil; Pandey, Shashi B.; Pavana, M.; Pian, Elena; Riddle, Reed; Sánchez-Ramírez, Rubén; Sharma, Yashvi; Singh, Avinash; Smith, Roger; Soumagnac, Maayane T.; Taggart, Kirsty; Tan, Hanjie; Tzanidakis, Anastasios; Troja, Eleonora; Valeev, Azamat F.; Walters, Richard; Waratkar, Gaurav; Webb, Sara; Yu, Po-Chieh; Zhang, Bin-Bin; Zhou, Rongpu; Zolkower, Jeffry, We present a systematic search for optical counterparts to 13 gravitational wave (GW) triggers involving at least one neutron star during LIGO/Virgo's third observing run (O3). We searched binary neutron star (BNS) and neutron star black hole (NSBH) merger localizations with the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) and undertook follow-up with the Global Relay of Observatories Watching Transients Happen (GROWTH) collaboration. The GW triggers had a median localization area of 4480 deg2, a median distance of 267 Mpc, and false-alarm rates ranging from 1.5 to 10-25 yr-1. The ZTF coverage in the g and r bands had a median enclosed probability of 39%, median depth of 20.8 mag, and median time lag between merger and the start of observations of 1.5 hr. The O3 follow-up by the GROWTH team comprised 340 UltraViolet/Optical/InfraRed (UVOIR) photometric points, 64 OIR spectra, and three radio images using 17 different telescopes. We find no promising kilonovae (radioactivity-powered counterparts), and we show how to convert the upper limits to constrain the underlying kilonova luminosity function. Initially, we assume that all GW triggers are bona fide astrophysical events regardless of false-alarm rate and that kilonovae accompanying BNS and NSBH mergers are drawn from a common population; later, we relax these assumptions. Assuming that all kilonovae are at least as luminous as the discovery magnitude of GW170817 (-16.1 mag), we calculate that our joint probability of detecting zero kilonovae is only 4.2%. If we assume that all kilonovae are brighter than-16.6 mag (the extrapolated peak magnitude of GW170817) and fade at a rate of 1 mag day-1 (similar to GW170817), the joint probability of zero detections is 7%. If we separate the NSBH and BNS populations based on the online classifications, the joint probability of zero detections, assuming all kilonovae are brighter than-16.6 mag, is 9.7% for NSBH and 7.9% for BNS mergers. Moreover, no more than 10-4, or φ > 30° to be consistent with our limits. We look forward to searches in the fourth GW observing run; even 17 neutron star mergers with only 50% coverage to a depth of-16 mag would constrain the maximum fraction of bright kilonovae to, This work was supported by the Global Relay of Observatories Watching Transients Happen (GROWTH) project, funded by the National Science Foundation under PIRE grant No. 1545949. GROWTH is a collaborative project among the California Institute of Technology (USA), University of Maryland College Park (USA), University of Wisconsin Milwaukee (USA), Texas Tech University (USA), San Diego State University (USA), University of Washington (USA), Los Alamos National Laboratory (USA), Tokyo Institute of Technology (Japan), National Central University (Taiwan), Indian Institute of Astrophysics (India), Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (India), Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel), The Oskar Klein Centre at Stockholm University (Sweden), Humboldt University (Germany), Liverpool John Moores University (UK), and University of Sydney (Australia). Based on observations obtained with the Samuel Oschin Telescope 48 inch and the 60 inch telescope at the Palomar Observatory as part of the Zwicky Transient Facility project. The ZTF is supported by the National Science Foundation under grant No. AST-1440341 and a collaboration including Caltech, IPAC, the Weizmann Institute for Science, the Oskar Klein Center at Stockholm University, the University of Maryland, the University of Washington, Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron and Humboldt University, Los Alamos National Laboratories, the TANGO Consortium of Taiwan, the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories. Operations are conducted by COO, IPAC, and UW. The ZTF forced photometry service was funded under Heising-Simons Foundation grant No. 12540303 (PI: Graham). The SED Machine is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under grant No. 1106171. The GROWTH-India telescope is a 70 cm telescope with a 0.7 degrees field of view, set up by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics and the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay with support from the Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF) and the Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB) of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India (https://sites.google.com/view/growthindia/). It is located at the Indian Astronomical Observatory (Hanle), operated by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA). The GROWTH-India project is supported by SERB and administered by IUSSTF under grant No. IUSSTF/PIRE Program/GROWTH/2015-16. This research has made use of the VizieR catalog access tool, CDS, Strasbourg, France (doi: 10.26093/cds/vizier). The original description of the VizieR service was published in A&AS 143, 23. These results made use of the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) at Lowell Observatory. Lowell is a private, nonprofit institution dedicated to astrophysical research and public appreciation of astronomy and operates the LDT in partnership with Boston University, the University of Maryland, the University of Toledo, Northern Arizona University, and Yale University. The Large Monolithic Imager was built by Lowell Observatory using funds provided by the National Science Foundation (AST-1005313). The upgrade of the DeVeny optical spectrograph has been funded by a generous grant from John and Ginger Giovale and a grant from the Mt. Cuba Astronomical Foundation. The KPED team thanks the National Science Foundation and the National Optical Astronomical Observatory for making the Kitt Peak 2.1 m telescope available. We thank the observatory staff at Kitt Peak for their efforts to assist Robo-AO KP operations. The KPED team thanks the National Science Foundation, the National Optical Astronomical Observatory, the Caltech Space Innovation Council, and the Murty family for support in the building and operation of KPED. In addition, they thank the CHIMERA project for use of the Electron Multiplying CCD (EMCCD). The Liverpool Telescope is operated on the island of La Palma by Liverpool John Moores University in the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias with financial support from the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council. Some spectroscopic observations were obtained with the Southern African Large Telescope (SALT). The Photometric Redshifts for the Legacy Surveys (PRLS) catalog used in this paper was produced thanks to funding from the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, Office of High Energy Physics, via grant DE-SC0007914. This publication has made use of data collected at Lulin Observatory, partly supported by MoST grant 108-2112-M-008-001. Based on observations made with the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC), installed at the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias on the island of La Palma. M.M.K. acknowledges generous support from the David and Lucille Packard Foundation. M.W.C. acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation with grant No. PHY-2010970. A.G. and J.S. acknowledge support from the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation and GREAT research environment grant 2016-06012, funded by the Swedish Research Council. Some of the work by D.A.P. was performed at the Aspen Center for Physics, which is supported by National Science Foundation grant PHY-1607611. D.A.P. was partially supported by a grant from the Simons Foundation. H.K. thanks the LSSTC Data Science Fellowship Program, which is funded by LSSTC, NSF Cybertraining Grant 1829740, the Brinson Foundation, and the Moore Foundation; his participation in the program has benefited this work. This work has been supported by the Spanish Science Ministry Centro de Excelencia Severo Ochoa Program under grant SEV-2017-0709. A.J.C.T. acknowledges support from the Junta de Andalucia (Project P07-TIC-03094) and Spanish Ministry Projects AYA2012-39727-C03-01, AYA2015-71718R, and PID-019-109974RB-I00. V.A.F. was supported by grant RFBR 19-02-00432. I.A. acknowledges support by a Ramon y Cajal grant (RYC-2013-14511) of the Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovacion, y Universidades (MICIU) of Spain. He also acknowledges financial support from MCIU through grant AYA2016-80889-P. A.A.M. is funded by the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope Corporation, the Brinson Foundation, and the Moore Foundation in support of the LSSTC Data Science Fellowship Program; he also receives support as a CIERA Fellow by the CIERA Postdoctoral Fellowship Program (Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics, Northwestern University). A.C. acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation with grant No. 1907975. W.-H.I., A. K., K.-L.L., C.-C.N., A.P., H.T., and P.-C.Y. acknowledge support from Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) Taiwan grants 104-2923-M-008-004-MY5, 107-2119-M-008-012, 108-2628-M-007-005-RSP, and 108-2112-M-007-025-MY3. D.D. is supported by an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship. S.A. is supported by the GROWTH project, funded by the National Science Foundation under PIRE grant No. 1545949. A.S.C. is supported by GREAT research environment grant 2016-06012, funded by the Swedish Research Council. E.C.K. acknowledges support from the G.R.E.A.T. research environment and the Wenner-Gren Foundations. A.J.C.T. is thankful for fruitful discussions with J. Cepa, E. Fernandez-Garcia, J. A. Font, S. Jeong, A. Martin-Carrillo, A. M. Sintes, and S. Sokolov. D.A.H.B. acknowledges research support from the National Research Foundation of South Africa. S.B.P. and V.B. acknowledge BRICS grant No. "DST/IMRCD/BRICS/PilotCall1/ProFCheap/2017(G)" for part of the present work. J.S.B. was partially supported by a Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation Data-Driven Discovery grant and a grant from the National Science Foundation, "Conceptualization of a Scalable Cyberinfrastructure Center for Multimessenger Astrophysics."

We study the flux variation in helium white dwarfs (WDs) induced by dynamical tides for a variety of WD models with effective temperatures ranging from $T$=10 kK to $T$=26 kK. At linear order, we find the dynamical tide can significantly perturb the observed flux in hot WDs. If the temperature $T\gtrsim14$ kK, then the dynamical tide may induce a fractional change in the flux by >1% when the orbital period is $P_{\rm orb}\simeq 20-60\,{\rm min}$. The ratio between the flux modulation due to the dynamical tide and that due to the equilibrium tide (i.e., ellipsoidal variability) increases as the WD's radius decreases, and it could exceed O(10) if the WD has a radius $R\lesssim0.03 R_\odot$. Unlike the ellipsoidal variability which is in phase with the orbital motion, the pulsation caused by the dynamical tide may have a substantial phase shift. A cold WD with $T\lesssim 10$ kK, on the other hand, is unlikely to show observable pulsations due to the dynamical tide. At shorter orbital periods, the dynamical tide may become highly nonlinear. We approximate this regime by treating the waves as one-way traveling waves and find the flux variation is typically reduced to 0.1%-1% and the excess phase is likely to be 90 degrees (though with large uncertainty). Even in the traveling-wave limit, the flux perturbation due to dynamical tide could still exceed the ellipsoidal variability for compact WDs with $R\lesssim0.02 R_\odot$. We further estimate the nonlinear flux perturbations oscillating at four times the orbital frequency dominated by a self-coupled parent g-mode driving low-order daughter p-modes. The nonlinear flux variation could be nearly 50% of the linear variation for very hot WD models with $T\gtrsim26$ kK and 1% linear flux variation. We thus predict both the linear and nonlinear flux variations due to dynamical tides are likely to have significant observational signatures., 17 pages, 14 figures, submitted to MNRAS

Author(s): Strotjohann, NL; Ofek, EO; Gal-Yam, A; Bruch, R; Schulze, S; Shaviv, N; Sollerman, J; Filippenko, AV; Yaron, O; Fremling, C; Nordin, J; Kool, EC; Perley, DA; Ho, AYQ; Yang, Y; Yao, Y; Soumagnac, MT; Graham, ML; Barbarino, C; Tartaglia, L; De, K; Goldstein, DA; Cook, DO; Brink, TG; Taggart, K; Yan, L; Lunnan, R; Kasliwal, M; Kulkarni, SR; Nugent, PE; Masci, FJ; Rosnet, P; Adams, SM; Andreoni, I; Bagdasaryan, A; Bellm, EC; Burdge, K; Duev, DA; Dugas, A; Frederick, S; Goldwasser, S; Hankins, M; Irani, I; Karambelkar, V; Kupfer, T; Liang, J; Neill, JD; Porter, M; Riddle, RL; Sharma, Y; Short, P; Taddia, F; Tzanidakis, A; Van Roestel, J; Walters, R; Zhuang, Z | Abstract: Interaction-powered supernovae (SNe) explode within an optically thick circumstellar medium (CSM) that could be ejected during eruptive events. To identify and characterize such pre-explosion outbursts, we produce forcedphotometry light curves for 196 interacting SNe, mostly of Type IIn, detected by the Zwicky Transient Facility between early 2018 and 2020 June. Extensive tests demonstrate that we only expect a few false detections among the 70,000 analyzed pre-explosion images after applying quality cuts and bias corrections. We detect precursor eruptions prior to 18 Type IIn SNe and prior to the Type Ibn SN 2019uo. Precursors become brighter and more frequent in the last months before the SN and month-long outbursts brighter than magnitude -13 occur prior to 25% (5-69%, 95% confidence range) of all Type IIn SNe within the final three months before the explosion. With radiative energies of up to 1049erg, precursors could eject ~1M⊙of material. Nevertheless, SNe with detected precursors are not significantly more luminous than other SNe IIn, and the characteristic narrow hydrogen lines in their spectra typically originate from earlier, undetected mass-loss events. The long precursor durations require ongoing energy injection, and they could, for example, be powered by interaction or by a continuum-driven wind. Instabilities during the neon- and oxygen-burning phases are predicted to launch precursors in the final years to months before the explosion; however, the brightest precursor is 100 times more energetic than anticipated.

(Abridged) Palomar Gattini-IR is a new wide-field, near-infrared robotic time domain survey operating at Palomar Observatory. Using a 30 cm telescope mounted with a H2RG detector, Gattini-IR achieves a field of view of 25 sq. deg. with a pixel scale of 8.7" in J-band. Here, we describe the system design, survey operations, data processing system and on-sky performance of Palomar Gattini-IR. As a part of the nominal survey, Gattini-IR scans $\approx 7500$ square degrees of the sky every night to a median 5$\sigma$ depth of $15.7$ AB mag outside the Galactic plane. The survey covers $\approx 15000$ square degrees of the sky visible from Palomar with a median cadence of 2 days. A real-time data processing system produces stacked science images from dithered raw images taken on sky, together with PSF-fit source catalogs and transient candidates identified from subtractions within a median delay of $\approx 4$ hours from the time of observation. The calibrated data products achieve an astrometric accuracy (RMS) of $\approx 0.7$" with respect to Gaia DR2 for sources with S/N $> 10$, and better than $\approx 0.35$" for sources brighter than $\approx 12$ Vega mag. The photometric accuracy (RMS) achieved in the PSF-fit source catalogs is better than $\approx 3$% for sources brighter than $\approx 12$ Vega mag, as calibrated against the 2MASS catalog. With a field of view $\approx 40\times$ larger than any other existing near infrared imaging instrument, Gattini-IR is probing the reddest and dustiest transients in the local universe such as dust obscured supernovae in nearby galaxies, novae behind large columns of extinction within the galaxy, reddened micro-lensing events in the Galactic plane and variability from cool and dust obscured stars. We present results from transients and variables identified since the start of the commissioning period., Comment: 35 pages, 29 figures. Submitted to PASP