Online analysis of ROTSE-III sky patrol fields has revealed an interesting transient which we designate ROTSE3 J151453.6+020934.2. This object is absent in images taken up until 28 March 2004, and is present in images from both ROTSE-3a and ROTSE-3b from 29 March 2004 through (at least) 01 April 2004:
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The Digitized Sky Survey location reveals two dim stars. The one at our transient location is in the USNO A2.0 and B catalogs at 19th magnitude and 20th magnitude respectively. Visual inspection of the USNO plate scans reveal the counterpart varies noticeably, but does not get as bright as 16th magnitude in any of the epochs.
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Meanwhile, when the Sloan Digital Sky Survey observed this location in 1998, the transient was in outburst (m_r = 16), and a color-color plot for the field is shown below. The crosses denote the colors of the object:
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The colors of this object are consistent with a white dwarf, so we presume this is some class of nova.
Finally, a full light curve of the transient so far is shown here. It appears to be still getting brighter, and is currently at m_r~15.5 on 1 April 2004:
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The position of the object is (J2000):
| RA: 228.72352 | DEC: 2.1595619 |
| L: 3.099 | B: 47.555 |