The Most Luminous Known Fast Blue Optical Transient AT 2024wpp: Unprecedented Evolution and Properties in the Ultraviolet to the Near-infrared

Abstract We present an extensive photometric and spectroscopic ultraviolet–optical–infrared campaign on the luminous fast blue optical transient (LFBOT) AT 2024wpp over the first ∼100 days. AT 2024wpp is the most luminous LFBOT discovered to date, with L pk ≈ (2–4) × 10 45 erg s −1 (5–10 times that of the prototypical AT 2018cow). This extreme luminosity enabled the acquisition of the most detailed LFBOT UV light curve thus far. In the first ∼45 days, AT 2024wpp radiated >10 51 erg, surpassing AT 2018cow by an order of magnitude and requiring a power source beyond the radioactive 56 Ni decay of traditional supernovae. Like AT 2018cow, the UV–optical spectrum of AT 2024wpp is dominated by a persistently blue thermal continuum throughout our monitoring, with blackbody parameters at a peak of T > 30,000 K and R BB / t ≈ 0.2 c –0.3 c . We find evidence for cooling until ∼10 days; thereafter, T ≳ 20,000 K is maintained. We interpret the featureless spectra as a consequence of continuous energy injection from a central source of high-energy emission that maintains high ejecta ionization. After 35 days, faint (equivalent width (EW) ≲ 10 Å) H and He spectral features with kinematically separate velocity components centered at 0 and −6400 km s −1 emerge, implying spherical symmetry deviations. A near-infrared excess of emission above the optical blackbody emerges between 20 and 30 days, with a power-law spectrum F ν ,NIR ∝ ν −0.3 at 30 days. We interpret this distinct emission component as either reprocessing of early UV emission in a dust echo or free–free emission in an extended medium above the optical photosphere. LFBOT asphericity and multiple outflow components (including mildly relativistic ejecta), together with the large radiated energy, are naturally realized by super-Eddington accretion disks around neutron stars or black holes and their outflows.