Optical monitoring of the Seyfert galaxy NGC 4151 and possible periodicities in its historical light curve

Abstract

We report B, V, and R band CCD photometry of the Seyfert galaxy NGC 4151\nobtained with the 1.0-m telescope at Weihai Observatory of Shandong University\nand the 1.56-m telescope at Shanghai Astronomical Observatory from 2005\nDecember to 2013 February. Combining all available data from literature, we\nhave constructed a historical light curve from 1910 to 2013 to study the\nperiodicity of the source using three different methods (the Jurkevich method,\nthe Lomb-Scargle periodogram method and the Discrete Correlation Function\nmethod). We find possible periods of P_1=4\\pm0.1, P_2=7.5\\pm0.3 and\nP_3=15.9\\pm0.3 yr.\n