Hot, Dust-Obscured Galaxies (Hot DOGs), selected from the WISE all sky infrared survey, host some of the most powerful Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) known, and might represent an important stage in the evolution of galaxies. Most known Hot DOGs are at z > 1.5, due in part to a strong bias against identifying them at lower redshift related to the selection criteria. We present a new selection method that identifies 153 Hot DOG candidates at z ∼ 1, where they are significantly brighter and easier to study. We validate this approach by measuring a redshift z = 1.009, and an SED similar to higher redshift Hot DOGs for one of these objects, WISE J1036+0449 (L Bol ≃ 8 × 10 46 erg s −1 ), using data from Keck/LRIS and NIRSPEC, SDSS, and CSO. We find evidence of a broadened component in Mg ii, which, if due to the gravitational potential of the supermassive black hole, would imply a black hole mass of M BH ≃ 2 × 10 8 M ⊙ , and an Eddington ratio of λ Edd ≃ 2.7. WISE J1036+0449 is the first Hot DOG detected by NuSTAR, and the observations show that the source is heavily obscured, with a column density of N H ≃ (2 − 15) × 10 23 cm −2 . The source has an intrinsic 2-10 keV luminosity of ∼ 6×10 44 erg s −1 , a value significantly lower than that expected from the mid-infrared/Xray correlation. We also find that the other Hot DOGs observed by X-ray facilities show a similar deficiency of X-ray flux. We discuss the origin of the X-ray weakness and the absorption properties of Hot DOGs. Hot DOGs at z 1 could be excellent laboratories to probe the characteristics of the accretion flow and of the X-ray emitting plasma at extreme values of the Eddington ratio.
Broadband X-ray spectroscopy of the X-ray emission produced in the coronae of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) can provide important insights into the physical conditions very close to their central supermassive black holes. The temperature of the Comptonizing plasma that forms the corona is manifested through a high-energy cutoff that has been difficult to directly constrain even in the brightest AGN because it requires high-quality data at energies above 10 keV. In this paper we present a large collection of coronal cutoff constraints for obscured AGNs based on a sample of 130AGNs selected in the hard X-ray band with Swift/BAT and observed nearly simultaneously with NuSTAR and Swift/XRT. We find that under a reasonable set of assumptions regarding partial constraints the median cutoff is well constrained to 290±20 keV, where the uncertainty is statistical and given at the 68% confidence level. We investigate the sensitivity of this result to our assumptions and find that consideration of various known systematic uncertainties robustly places the median cutoff between 240 and 340 keV. The central 68% of the intrinsic cutoff distribution is found to be between about 140 and 500 keV, with estimated uncertainties of 20 and 100 keV, respectively. In comparison with the literature, we find no clear evidence that the cutoffs in obscured and unobscured AGNs are substantially different. Our analysis highlights the importance of carefully considering partial and potentially degenerate constraints on the coronal high-energy cutoff in AGNs.Unified Astronomy Thesaurus concepts: Active galactic nuclei (16); X-ray active galactic nuclei (2035); Seyfert galaxies (1447); High energy astrophysics (739); X-ray surveys (1824)
We present the first results of the Galaxy Activity, Torus, and Outflow Survey (GATOS), a project aimed at understanding the properties of the dusty molecular tori and their connection to the host galaxy in nearby Seyfert galaxies. Our project expands the range of active galactic nuclei (AGN) luminosities and Eddington ratios covered by previous surveys of Seyferts conducted by the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA), allowing us to study the gas feeding and feedback cycle in a combined sample of 19 Seyferts. We used ALMA to obtain new images of the emission of molecular gas and dust using the CO(3–2) and HCO+(4–3) lines as well as their underlying continuum emission at 870 μm with high spatial resolutions (0.1″ ∼ 7 − 13 pc) in the circumnuclear disks (CND) of ten nearby (D < 28 Mpc) Seyfert galaxies selected from an ultra-hard X-ray survey. Our new ALMA observations detect 870 μm continuum and CO line emission from spatially resolved disks located around the AGN in all the sources. The bulk of the 870 μm continuum flux can be accounted for by thermal emission from dust in the majority of the targets. For most of the sources, the disks show a preponderant orientation perpendicular to the AGN wind axes, as expected for dusty molecular tori. The median diameters and molecular gas masses of the tori are ∼42 pc and ∼6 × 105 M⊙, respectively. We also detected the emission of the 4–3 line of HCO+ in four GATOS targets. The order of magnitude differences found in the CO/HCO+ ratios within our combined sample point to a very different density radial stratification inside the dusty molecular tori of these Seyferts. We find a positive correlation between the line-of-sight gas column densities responsible for the absorption of X-rays and the molecular gas column densities derived from CO toward the AGN in our sources. Furthermore, the median values of both column densities are similar. This suggests that the neutral gas line-of-sight column densities of the dusty molecular tori imaged by ALMA significantly contribute to the obscuration of X-rays. The radial distributions of molecular gas in the CND of our combined sample show signs of nuclear-scale molecular gas deficits. We also detect molecular outflows in the sources that show the most extreme nuclear-scale gas deficits in our sample. These observations find for the first time supporting evidence that the imprint of AGN feedback is more extreme in higher luminosity and/or higher Eddington ratio Seyfert galaxies.
The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that:• a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in DRO • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders.Please consult the full DRO policy for further details. ABSTRACT NGC 1448 is one of the nearest luminous galaxies (L 8−1000µm > 10 9 L ⊙ ) to ours (z = 0.00390), and yet the active galactic nucleus (AGN) it hosts was only recently discovered, in 2009. In this paper, we present an analysis of the nuclear source across three wavebands: mid-infrared (MIR) continuum, optical, and X-rays. We observed the source with the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR), and combined this data with archival Chandra data to perform broadband X-ray spectral fitting (≈0.5-40 keV) of the AGN for the first time. Our X-ray spectral analysis reveals that the AGN is buried under a Compton-thick (CT) column of obscuring gas along our line-of-sight, with a column density of N H (los) 2.5 × 10 24 cm −2 . The best-fitting torus models measured an intrinsic 2-10 keV luminosity of L 2−10,int = (3.5-7.6) × 10 40 erg s −1 , making NGC 1448 one of the lowest luminosity CTAGNs known. In addition to the NuSTAR observation, we also performed optical spectroscopy for the nucleus in this edge-on galaxy using the European Southern Observatory New Technology Telescope. We re-classify the optical nuclear spectrum as a Seyfert on the basis of the Baldwin-Philips-Terlevich diagnostic diagrams, thus identifying the AGN at optical wavelengths for the first time. We also present high spatial resolution MIR observations of NGC 1448 with Gemini/TReCS, in which a compact nucleus is clearly detected. The absorption-corrected 2-10 keV luminosity measured from our X-ray spectral analysis agrees with that predicted from the optical [Oiii]λ5007Å emission line and the MIR 12µm continuum, further supporting the CT nature of the AGN.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.