Abstract.We report the discovery of a new bright (V ∼ 12.6) cataclysmic variable star identified with the ROSAT X-ray source RX J1643.7+3402. Spectroscopic and photometric observations show it to be a novalike variable sharing some of the characteristics of the SW Sex sub-class of novalike CVs. The spectroscopic period may be either 2.h 575 or 2. h 885, within the period "gap". A photometric modulation with a probable period of 2. h 595 and an amplitude of ∼0.1 mag in V is present on most nights and could be either a "positive" or a "negative" superhump modulation (depending on the exact spectroscopic period), indicating the presence of a precessing accretion disk in this system. Rapid variations of 0.1 to 0.2 mag amplitude in V repeat with a time scale of ∼15 min.

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Abstract. To build a large, optically bright, X-ray selected AGN sample we have correlated the ROSAT-FSC catalogue of X-ray sources with the USNO catalogue limited to objects brighter than O = 16.5 and then with the APS database. Each of the 3212 coincidences was classified using the slitless Hamburg spectra. 493 objects were found to be extended and 2719 starlike. Using both the extended objects and the galaxies known from published catalogues we built up a sample of 185 galaxies with O APS < 17.0 mag, which are high-probability counterparts of RASS-FSC X-ray sources. 130 galaxies have a redshift from the literature and for another 34 we obtained new spectra. The fraction of Seyfert galaxies in this sample is 20%. To select a corresponding sample of 144 high-probability counterparts among the starlike sources we searched for very blue objects in an APS-based color-magnitude diagram. Forty-one were already known AGN and for another 91 objects we obtained new spectra, yielding 42 new AGN, increasing their number in the sample to 83. This confirms that surveys of bright QSOs are still significantly incomplete. On the other hand we find that, at a flux limit of 0.02 count s −1 and at this magnitude, only 40% of all QSOs are detected by ROSAT.

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