We describe here the most ambitious survey currently planned in the optical, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). The LSST design is driven by four main science themes: probing dark energy and dark matter, taking an inventory of the solar system, exploring the transient optical sky, and mapping the Milky Way. LSST will be a large, wide-field ground-based system designed to obtain repeated images covering the sky visible from Cerro Pachón in northern Chile. The telescope will have an 8.4 m (6.5 m effective) primary mirror, a 9.6 deg 2 field of view, a 3.2-gigapixel camera, and six filters (ugrizy) covering the wavelength range 320-1050 nm. The project is in the construction phase and will begin regular survey operations by 2022. About 90% of the observing time will be devoted to a deep-wide-fast survey mode that will uniformly observe a 18,000 deg 2 region about 800 times (summed over all six bands) during the anticipated 10 yr of operations and will yield a co-added map to r∼27.5. These data will result in databases including about 32 trillion observations of 20 billion galaxies and a similar number of stars, and they will serve the majority of the primary science programs. The remaining 10% of the observing time will be allocated to special projects such as Very Deep and Very Fast time domain surveys, whose details are currently under discussion. We illustrate how the LSST science drivers led to these choices of system parameters, and we describe the expected data products and their characteristics.

The Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) is a new optical time-domain survey that uses the Palomar 48 inch Schmidt telescope. A custom-built wide-field camera provides a 47 deg 2 field of view and 8 s readout time, yielding more than an order of magnitude improvement in survey speed relative to its predecessor survey, the Palomar Transient Factory. We describe the design and implementation of the camera and observing system. The ZTF data system at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center provides near-real-time reduction to identify moving and varying objects. We outline the analysis pipelines, data products, and associated archive. Finally, we present on-sky performance analysis and first scientific results from commissioning and the early survey. ZTF's public alert stream will serve as a useful precursor for that of the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope.

We present observations of SN 2021csp, the second example of a newly identified type of supernova (SN) hallmarked by strong, narrow, P Cygni carbon features at early times (Type Icn). The SN appears as a fast and luminous blue transient at early times, reaching a peak absolute magnitude of −20 within 3 days due to strong interaction between fast SN ejecta (v ≈ 30,000 km s−1) and a massive, dense, fast-moving C/O wind shed by the WC-like progenitor months before explosion. The narrow-line features disappear from the spectrum 10–20 days after explosion and are replaced by a blue continuum dominated by broad Fe features, reminiscent of Type Ibn and IIn supernovae and indicative of weaker interaction with more extended H/He-poor material. The transient then abruptly fades ∼60 days post-explosion when interaction ceases. Deep limits at later phases suggest minimal heavy-element nucleosynthesis, a low ejecta mass, or both, and imply an origin distinct from that of classical Type Ic SNe. We place SN 2021csp in context with other fast-evolving interacting transients, and discuss various progenitor scenarios: an ultrastripped progenitor star, a pulsational pair-instability eruption, or a jet-driven fallback SN from a Wolf–Rayet (W-R) star. The fallback scenario would naturally explain the similarity between these events and radio-loud fast transients, and suggests a picture in which most stars massive enough to undergo a W-R phase collapse directly to black holes at the end of their lives.

We report the discovery and panchromatic follow-up observations of the young Type Ic supernova (SN Ic) SN 2020oi in M100, a grand-design spiral galaxy at a mere distance of 14 Mpc. We followed up with observations at radio, X-ray, and optical wavelengths from only a few days to several months after explosion. The optical behavior of the supernova is similar to those of other normal SNe Ic. The event was not detected in the X-ray band but our radio observations revealed a bright mJy source (»ń 4 1 for an assumed wind velocity of-1000 km s 1. The temporal evolution of the radio emission suggests a radial CSM density structure steeper than the standard r −2 .

The IceCube neutrino observatory pursues a follow-up program selecting interesting neutrino events in real-time and issuing alerts for electromagnetic follow-up observations. In 2012 March, the most significant neutrino alert during the first three years of operation was issued by IceCube. In the follow-up observations performed by the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF), a Type IIn supernova (SN IIn) PTF12csy was found 0°. 2 away from the neutrino alert direction, with an error radius of 0°. 54. It has a redshift of z = 0.0684, corresponding to a luminosity distance of about 300 Mpc and the Pan-STARRS1 survey shows that its explosion time was at least 158 days (in host galaxy rest frame) before the neutrino alert, so that a causal connection is unlikely. The a posteriori significance of the chance detection of both the neutrinos and the SN at any epoch is 2.2σ within IceCubeʼs 2011/12 data acquisition season. Also, a complementary neutrino analysis reveals no long-term signal over the course of one year. Therefore, we consider the SN detection coincidental and the neutrinos uncorrelated to the SN. However, the SN is unusual and interesting by itself: it is luminous and energetic, bearing strong resemblance to the SN IIn

We present a search for extragalactic fast blue optical transients (FBOTs) during Phase I of the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF). We identify 38 candidates with durations above half-maximum light 1 day < t 1/2 < 12 days, of which 28 have blue (g − r ≲ −0.2 mag) colors at peak light. Of the 38 transients (28 FBOTs), 19 (13) can be spectroscopically classified as core-collapse supernovae (SNe): 11 (8) H- or He-rich (Type II/IIb/Ib) SNe, 6 (4) interacting (Type IIn/Ibn) SNe, and 2 (1) H&He-poor (Type Ic/Ic-BL) SNe. Two FBOTs (published previously) had predominantly featureless spectra and luminous radio emission: AT2018lug (The Koala) and AT2020xnd (The Camel). Seven (five) did not have a definitive classification: AT 2020bdh showed tentative broad Hα in emission, and AT 2020bot showed unidentified broad features and was 10 kpc offset from the center of an early-type galaxy. Ten (eight) have no spectroscopic observations or redshift measurements. We present multiwavelength (radio, millimeter, and/or X-ray) observations for five FBOTs (three Type Ibn, one Type IIn/Ibn, one Type IIb). Additionally, we search radio-survey (VLA and ASKAP) data to set limits on the presence of radio emission for 24 of the transients. All X-ray and radio observations resulted in nondetections; we rule out AT2018cow-like X-ray and radio behavior for five FBOTs and more luminous emission (such as that seen in the Camel) for four additional FBOTs. We conclude that exotic transients similar to AT2018cow, the Koala, and the Camel represent a rare subset of FBOTs and use ZTF’s SN classification experiments to measure the rate to be at most 0.1% of the local core-collapse SN rate.

We present X-ray, UV, optical, and radio observations of the nearby (≈78 Mpc) tidal disruption event AT2021ehb/ZTF21aanxhjv during its first 430 days of evolution. AT2021ehb occurs in the nucleus of a galaxy hosting a≈10 7 M e black hole (M BH inferred from host galaxy scaling relations). High-cadence Swift and Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) monitoring reveals a delayed X-ray brightening. The spectrum first undergoes a gradual soft → hard transition and then suddenly turns soft again within 3 days at δt≈272 days during which the X-ray flux drops by a factor of 10. In the joint NICER+NuSTAR observation (δt = 264 days, harder state), we observe a prominent nonthermal component up to 30 keV and an extremely broad emission line in the iron K band. The bolometric luminosity of AT2021ehb reaches a maximum ofEdd when the X-ray spectrum is the hardest. During the dramatic X-ray evolution, no radio emission is detected, the UV/optical luminosity stays relatively constant, and the optical spectra are featureless. We propose the following interpretations: (i) the soft → hard transition may be caused by the gradual formation of a magnetically dominated corona; (ii) hard X-ray photons escape from the system along solid angles with low scattering optical depth (∼a few) whereas the UV/optical emission is likely generated by reprocessing materials with much larger column density-the system is highly aspherical; and (iii) the abrupt X-ray flux drop may be triggered by the thermal-viscous instability in the inner accretion flow, leading to a much thinner disk.Unified Astronomy Thesaurus concepts: Tidal disruption (1696); X-ray transient sources (1852); Supermassive black holes (1663); Time domain astronomy (2109); High energy astrophysics (739); Accretion (14)

A new asteroid rotation period survey has been carried out by using the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF). Twelve consecutive PTF fields, which covered an area of 87 deg 2 in the ecliptic plane, were observed in the R band with a cadence of ∼20 minutes during 2013 February 15-18. We detected 2500 known asteroids with a diameter range of 0.5 km D 200 km. Of these, 313 objects had highly reliable rotation periods and exhibited the "spin barrier" at ∼2 hr. In contrast to the flat spin-rate distribution of the asteroids with 3 km D 15 km shown by Pravec et al., our results deviated somewhat from a Maxwellian distribution and showed a decrease at the spin rate greater than 5 rev day −1 . One superfast rotator candidate and two possible binary asteroids were also found in this work.