7 Albus 1 : A very bright white dwarf candidate

We have serendipitously discovered a previously-unknown, bright source (BT = 11.75±0.07mag) with a very blue VT − Ks color, to which we have named Albus 1. A photometric and astrometric study using Virtual Observatory tools has shown that it possesses an appreciable proper motion and magnitudes and colors very similar to those of the well known white dwarf G 191–B2B. We consider Albus 1 as a DA-type white dwarf located at about 40 pc. If confirmed its nature, Albus 1 would be the sixth brightest isolated white dwarf in the sky, which would make it an excellent spectrophotometric standard. Subject headings: white dwarfs – subdwarfs – solar neighbourhood