The Palomar Transient Factory Sky2Night programme

Journal Article · 27 January 2019 · Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stz241 · OSTI ID:1494375

van Roestel, J.  ^[1]; Groot, P. J. ^[1]; Kupfer, T. ^[2]; Verbeek, K. ^[1]; van Velzen, S. ^[3]; Bours, M. ^[4]; Nugent, P. ^[5]; Prince, T. ^[6]; Levitan, D. ^[6]; Nissanke, S. ^[1]; Kulkarni, S. R. ^[6]; Laher, R. R. ^[7]

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1. Department of Astrophysics/IMAPP, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO Box 9010, NL-6500 GL, Nijmegen, the Netherlands
2. Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA, Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA, Cahill Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
3. Center of Cosmology and Particle Physics, New York University, New York, NY 10003, USA
4. Instituto de Física y Astronomía, Universidad de Valparaíso, Avenida Gran Bretana 1111, Valparaíso 2360102, Chile
5. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, UC Berkley Department of Astronomy, Berkeley, CA, USA
6. Cahill Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
7. Spitzer Science Center, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA

Abstract We present results of the Sky2Night project: a systematic, unbiased search for fast optical transients with the Palomar Transient Factory. We have observed 407deg2 in R-band for eight nights at a cadence of 2 h. During the entire duration of the project, the 4.2 m William Herschel Telescope on La Palma was dedicated to obtaining identification spectra for the detected transients. During the search, we found 12 supernovae, 10 outbursting cataclysmic variables, nine flaring M-stars, three flaring active galactic nuclei, and no extragalactic fast optical transients. Using this systematic survey for transients, we have calculated robust observed rates for the detected types of transients, and upper limits of the rate of extragalactic fast optical transients of $$\mathcal {R}\lt 37\times 10^{-4}$$deg−2 d−1 and $$\mathcal {R}\lt 9.3\times 10^{-4}$$deg−2 d−1 for time-scales of 4 h and 1 d and a limiting magnitude of R ≈ 19.7. We use the results of this project to determine what kind of and how many astrophysical false positives we can expect when following up gravitational wave detections in search for kilonovae.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE; USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP) (SC-25)
• Grant/Contract Number: AC02-05CH11231
• OSTI ID: 1494375
• Journal Information: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Journal Name: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Journal Issue: 4 Vol. 484; ISSN 0035-8711
• Publisher: Oxford University PressCopyright Statement
• Country of Publication: United Kingdom
• Language: English