GCN Circular 42780
Subject
EP251118a: Optical detection with Kinder observations
Event
Date
2025-11-20T09:35:57Z (2 days ago)
From
Amar Aryan at National Central University, Institute of Astronomy (NCUIA) <amararyan941@gmail.com>
Via
Web form
Y.-H. Lee, A. Aryan, C.-S. Lin (all NCU), A. K. H. Kong (NTHU), T.-W. Chen (NCU), J. Gillanders, S. J. Smartt (both Oxford), Y. J. Yang (NYUAD), A. Sankar.K, Y.-C. Pan, C.-C. Ngeow, M.-H. Lee, C.-H. Lai, W.-J. Hou, H.-C. Lin, H.-Y. Hsiao, J.-K. Guo (all NCU), S. Yang, Z. N. Wang, L. L. Fan, G. H. Sun (all HNAS), H.-W. Lin (UMich), H. F. Stevance, S. Srivastav, L. Rhodes (all Oxford), M. Nicholl, M. Fulton, T. Moore, K. W. Smith, C. Angus, A. Aamer (all QUB), A. Schultz and M. Huber (both IfA, Hawaii) report:
We observed the field of the fast X-ray transient EP251118a (Jiang et al., GCN 42749) using the 1m LOT at Lulin Observatory in Taiwan as part of the Kinder collaboration (Chen & Yang et al., 2025, ApJ, 983, 86). The first LOT epoch of observations started at 16:21 UTC on the 19th of November 2025 (MJD 60998.681), 23.64 hr after the EP-WXT trigger.
We utilized the astroalign (Beroiz et al. 2020, A&C, 32, 100384) and astropy (Astropy Collaboration et al. 2022, ApJ, 935, 167) packages to align and stack the individual frames. We utilized the Python-based package AutoPhOT (Brennan & Fraser, 2022, A&A, 667, A62) to perform template subtraction with the DESI Legacy Survey (Dey et al. 2019, AJ 157, 168) DR10 image using the 'hotpants' (Becker A., 2015, ascl.soft. ascl:1504.004) algorithm. In the difference image, we clearly detected the optical counterpart candidate proposed by Malesani et al. (GCN 42751) at a spectroscopic redshift of z = 1.216 (An et al., GCN 42756), and confirmed by Belkin et al. (GCN 42758); Yadav et al. (GCN 42760); Busmann et al. (GCN 42763); Francile et al. (GCN 42767); and Urquijo-Rodríguez et al. (GCN 42773).
Moreover, we further utilized AutoPhOT to perform the PSF photometry. The details of the observations and the measured magnitude(in the AB system) are as follows:
Telescope | Filter | MJD (start) | t-t0 (hr) | Exposure (s) | Magnitude | avg. Seeing | med. Airmass
LOT | r | 60998.681 | 23.64 | 300 * 6 | 21.136 +/- 0.049 | 1".47 | 1.67
The presented magnitude is calibrated using the field stars from the ATLAS-RefCat2 catalog from MAST (Tonry J. L. et al. 2018, ApJ, 867, 105) and is not corrected for the expected Galactic foreground extinction of A_r = 0.034 mag in the direction of the transient (Schlafly & Finkbeiner 2011). The methodology, details on the Lulin observatory telescopes, and a compilation of our optical follow-up campaign for FXTs discovered within the first year of operation of the Einstein-Probe mission can be found in Aryan et al. 2025, ApJS, 281, 20, doi:10.3847/1538-4365/adfc69.