Gaia in the UK

Taking the Galactic Census

Observe - Alerts archive

On this page you can find the list of all Gaia Alerts which were suitable for observing with a small telescope.

Explanation of Alerts table

Alert ID: The name that was assigned to this Alert. Click on the link to see more information about the Alert.
Time: When Gaia first detected this Alert.
RA: The right ascension of the Alert (see Observing advice for more info).
Dec: The declination of the Alert.
Mag: The brightness of the Alert in Gaia magnitudes. For more information on magnitudes, see Observing advice. Note that a lower value for the magnitude means an Alert is brighter, and a higher value means it is fainter.
Classification: What sort of transient each Alert is.
Comment: Any additional information we have about why an alert is interesting, or information such as its distance.
Desired follow-up: Guidelines on what data we need from telescopes such as Faulkes for each Alert.
School: Initials of schools following-up this Alert (see Schools following-up Gaia Alerts).

Alert ID Time RAsort ascending Dec Magnitude Classification Comment Desired follow-up School
Gaia16alt 23 Apr 2016, 10:05 325.74996 66.19105 16.90 YSO 1.5 mag decline in YSO V* V350 Cep

Young Stellar Objects (YSOs) sometimes have dips in brightness. We've seen such a dip in Gaia16alt, and we need ri imaging every two nights to confirm!

Gaia17bnl 12 Jun 2017, 22:47 312.75374 44.53049 16.48 YSO 1 mag dip in YSO V1701 Cyg

Young star in the North American Nebula. Appears to fade because of dust in the local environment. Continuous observations preferred in two filters, e.g. V and I

Gaia16bgk 11 Sep 2016, 16:21 310.16636 -54.31064 14.15 SN Ia candidate SN in NGC 6942 GS-TEC predicts SN Ia

This is a nice nearby Type Ia SN, and it's bright too - mag~14.5. You should be able to spot this with a small telescope and a CCD camera.

Gaia16aye 5 Aug 2016, 00:53 295.00474 30.13149 14.27 ULENS 1.2 mag rise in red star near Galactic Plane

Gaia16aye is our favourite confirmed binary microlensing event. And it's still not over - so please continue observing while it declines back to 'normal'

Gaia18asi 24 Mar 2018, 01:36 275.09139 7.18534 12.00 XRB bright outburst in Gaia source, aka ASASSN-18ey, aka MAXI J1820+070, candidate X-ray binary

This was discovered first in the optical (by ASAS-SN) then in X-rays, and then we saw it brighten in Gaia. It's very likely to be an X-ray binary with a black hole at the centre. Continued photometric monitoring of this new system is encouraged - especially in a blue filter

Gaia17bej 7 May 2017, 14:30 274.25440 -31.38352 14.60 ULENS source towards Galactic Bulge brightens by 3 mags, candidate microlensing event

Candidate microlensing event... or is it? We don't know. Observe it to help us find out!

Gaia16aza 6 Aug 2016, 19:25 245.35763 -26.77503 14.98 unknown bright blue hostless transient

Our best guess is that this is a new Cataclsymic Variable. It's quite bright at 15th magnitude, and we request monitoring in blue and red filters (e.g. g and r). A spectrum would be great so we can try to understand if it's really a CV, or something even more exotic.

Gaia16aax 26 Jan 2016, 15:55 218.57701 49.21014 18.33 AGN slowly rising transient in galaxy core

The active galactic nucleus in the centre of this galaxy has started to fade again. It's now at magnitude ~19, so lets keep an eye on it: we need images in u, g, r and i filters about every two weeks.

Gaia18aod 8 Mar 2018, 09:11 208.36495 -67.41694 6.77 Nova confirmed Galactic Nova, extremely bright, aka Nova Circini 2018 (PNV J13532700-6725110)

An opportunity to observe a really bright Galactic Nova.

Gaia16bef 30 Aug 2016, 23:09 203.66082 -23.68151 15.21 SN Ia confirmed SN Ia, found by ASAS: SN 2016eiy

This is a bright Type Ia supernovae in a nearby galaxy! See if you can get some imaging of it - try ugri imaging every two nights, it's currently mag~16

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