TITLE: GCN CIRCULAR NUMBER: 8731 SUBJECT: GRB 081226: GROND afterglow candidate DATE: 08/12/26 03:08:29 GMT FROM: Paulo M. J. Afonso at MPE GRB 081226: GROND afterglow candidate P. Afonso, T. Kruehler (both MPE Garching), S. Klose (TLS Tautenburg), and J. Greiner (MPE Garching) report on behalf of the GROND team: GROND (Greiner et al. 2008, PASP 120, 405), mounted at the 2.2m ESO/MPI telescope at La Silla Observatory (Chile),started observations of the field of GRB 081226 (Godet et al. 2008, GCN #8729) in g'r'i'z'JHK at 01:14 UTC, 11 min after the burst. We detect a faint optical source in the XRT error circle (Godet et al. 2008, GCN #8729) at: RA(J2000): 08:01:59.92 DEC(J2000): -69:01:47.4 with uncertainties of 0.5". At a midtime of 01:57 UTC, we measure a rough preliminary r' band magnitude of 24.3 calibrated with the GROND zeropoint. No statement about variability can be made at this point. Observations are ongoing.