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Circular No. 8901 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) CBAT@CFA.HARVARD.EDU (science) URL http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/cbat.html ISSN 0081-0304 Phone 617-495-7440/7244/7444 (for emergency use only) COMET C/2007 W3 (LINEAR) An apparently asteroidal object discovered by the LINEAR project (discovery observation tabulated below), and posted on the Minor Planet Center's NEOCP webpage, has been found to show cometary appearance by several astrometric CCD observers, including R. Holmes (Charleston, IL, U.S.A., 0.61-m f/4.0 astrograph; Dec. 1.31 UT; measurer S. Foglia; five stacked images show a coma diameter of 6" and no tail); Q.-z. Ye (Department of Atmosphere Science, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China; Lulin Sky Survey 0.41-m Ritchey-Chretien reflector; Dec. 2.6; four combined 60-s unfiltered exposures show a small bright core < 2" in diameter with a total coma diameter of about 7"-8" that was slightly elongated in p.a. 90 deg); J. Young (Table Mountain, 0.61-m f/16 Cassegrain reflector; Dec. 3.3; very round 6" coma with bright central condensation and a possible hint of a broad, stubby 10" tail in p.a. 190 deg); and E. Guido and G. Sostero (Castellammare di Stabia, Italy, remotely using a 0.25-m f/3.4 reflector located near Mayhill, NM, U.S.A.; Dec. 3.5; 60 co-added unfiltered exposures show a coma nearly 8" in diameter, slightly elongated toward the northeast). 2007 UT R.A. (2000) Decl. Mag. Nov. 29.31590 6 09 41.63 +72 37 01.9 19.6 The available astrometry, the following preliminary orbital elements, and an ephemeris appear on MPEC 2007-X13. T = 2008 June 2.793 TT Peri. = 112.585 Node = 73.074 2000.0 q = 1.77775 AU Incl. = 78.679 V598 PUPPIS R. W. Russell, R. J. Rudy, and D. K. Lynch, The Aerospace Corporation; and C. E. Woodward, University of Minnesota, report 0.8- to 2.5-micron spectroscopy of this nova (cf. IAUC 8898, 8899) using the Infrared Telescope Facility (+ SpeX) on Nov. 30.52 UT. V598 Pup was in its coronal stage with no low excitation lines present. [Si VI] 1.96-microns and [Ca VIII] 2.32-microns were strong, along with He I 1.0830-microns and the H I lines. At least two of the unidentified novae lines were present (1.55 and 2.09 microns). The FWHM of the lines was approximately 2400 km/s, and there was no evidence of thermal emission from dust. (C) Copyright 2007 CBAT 2007 December 3 (8901) Daniel W. E. Green
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