We present a study of the newly discovered McNeil's nebula in Orion using the
JHKs-band simultaneous observations with the near-infrared (NIR) camera SIRIUS
on the IRSF 1.4m telescope. The cometary infrared nebula is clearly seen
extending toward north and south from the NIR source (V1647 Orionis) that
illuminates McNeil's nebula. The compact nebula has an apparent diameter of
about 70 arcsec. The nebula is blue (bright in J) and has a cavity structure
with two rims extending toward north-east and north-west. The north-east rim is
brighter and sharp, while the north-west rim is diffuse. The north-east rim can
be traced out to ~ 40 arcsec from the location of the NIR source. In contrast,
no cavity structure is seen toward the south, although diffuse nebula is
extended out to ~ 20 arcsec. New NIR photometric data show a significant
variation in the magnitudes (> 0.15 mag) of the source of McNeil's nebula
within a period of one week, that is possibly under the phase of eruptive
variables like FUors or EXors.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures in JPEG format. Accepted for the publication in
PASJ Letter
