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We present recent optical photometric observations of the blazar OJ 287 taken during 2015 September-2016 May. Our intense observations of the blazar started in 2015 November and continued until 2016 May and included detection of the large optical outburst in 2015 December that was predicted using the binary black hole model for OJ 287. For our observing campaign, we used a total of nine ground-based optical telescopes of which one is in Japan, one is in India, three are in Bulgaria, one is in Serbia, one is in Georgia, and two are in the USA. These observations were carried out in 102 nights with a total of similar to 1000 image frames in BVRI bands, though the majority were in the R band. We detected a second comparably strong flare in 2016 March. In addition, we investigated multiband flux variations, colour variations, and spectral changes in the blazar on diverse time-scales as they are useful in understanding the emission mechanisms. We briefly discuss the possible physical mechanisms most likely responsible for the observed flux, colour, and spectral variability.

One of the most intriguing open issues in galaxy evolution is the structure and evolution of active galactic nuclei (AGN) that emit intense light believed to come from an accretion disk near a super massive black hole(1,2). To understand the zoo of different AGN classes, it has been suggested that all AGN are the same type of object viewed from different angles(3). This model-called AGN unification-has been successful in predicting, for example, the existence of hidden broad optical lines in the spectrum of many narrow-line AGN. But this model is not unchallenged(4) and it is debatable whether more than viewing angle separates the so-called Type-1 and Type-2 AGN. Here we report the first large-scale study that finds strong differences in the galaxy neighbours to Type-1 and Type-2 AGN with data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS; ref. 5) Data Release 7 (DR7; ref. 6) and Galaxy Zoo(7,8). We find strong differences in the colour and AGN activity of the neighbours to Type-1 and Type-2 AGN and in how the fraction of AGN residing in spiral hosts changes depending on the presence or not of a neighbour. These findings suggest that an evolutionary link between the two major AGN types might exist.