Second outburst phase of a young eruptive star V1647 Orionis (McNeil’s nebula) Available to Purchase

Young low mass stars still embedded in dust and molecular gas pass through a stage of outbursts. These outbursts are due to sudden increase in accretion rate from the inner disc. V1647 Orionis underwent an FU Ori kind of outburst in 2004 and returned to its pre-outburst phase in early 2006. Within just 2 years it again underwent a second outburst in 2008; such an event is rarely seen in FU Ori type of outburst. We therefore followed the source in its second outburst phase from 2-m Himalayan Chandra Telescope (HCT) and 2-m IUCAA Girawali Observatory (IGO) Telescope. Our optical and near-infrared (NIR) photometric data show that the source is undergoing a slow but steady dimming of ∼ 0.3 – 0.5 mag since the recent second outburst. It seems that the observed properties of the outburst of V1647 Ori are different from both the EX Ori and FU Ori type of outbursts, and suggest that this star probably represents a new type of eruptive young star, to be different from both FU Ori and EX Ori classes.