Quasar feedback survey: molecular gas affected by central outflows and by ∼10-kpc radio lobes reveal dual feedback effects in ‘radio quiet’ quasars

Girdhar, A; Harrison, C M; Mainieri, V; Fernández Aranda, R; Alexander, D M; Arrigoni Battaia, F; Bianchin, M; Calistro Rivera, G; Circosta, C; Costa, T; Edge, A C; Farina, E P; Kakkad, D; Kharb, P; Molyneux, S J; Mukherjee, D; Njeri, A; S., Silpa; Venturi, G; Ward, S R

doi:10.1093/mnras/stad3453

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 110 publications

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“…Simulations show that low-power jets (P jet ≲ 10 45 erg s −1 ) become trapped for a longer time by the ISM and disrupt the surrounding gas over a larger volume, and for a longer period, than jets of higher powers (P jet ≳ 10 45 erg s −1 ), which are capable of "drilling" through the ISM [204]. Therefore, the low-power jets often detected in radiatively efficient AGN such as Seyferts and quasars can be more disruptive and induce more massive outflows than high-power jets [52,196,[205][206][207][208]. Finally, the distribution of molecular gas is another factor leading to more or less efficient coupling.…”

Section: Coupling Between Energy and Gasmentioning

confidence: 99%

Observational Tests of Active Galactic Nuclei Feedback: An Overview of Approaches and Interpretation

Harrison,

Ramos Almeida

2024

Galaxies

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Growing supermassive black holes (Active Galactic Nuclei; AGN) release energy with the potential to alter their host galaxies and larger-scale environment; a process named “AGN feedback”. Feedback is a required component of galaxy formation models and simulations to explain the observed properties of galaxy populations. We provide a broad overview of observational approaches that are designed to establish the physical processes that couple AGN energy to the multi-phase gas, or to find evidence that AGN impact upon galaxy evolution. The orders-of-magnitude range in spatial, temporal, and temperature scales, requires a diverse set of observational studies. For example, studying individual targets in detail sheds light on coupling mechanisms; however, evidence for the long-term impact of AGN is better established within galaxy populations that are not necessarily currently active. We emphasise how modern surveys have revealed the importance of radio emission for identifying and characterising feedback mechanisms. At the achieved sensitivities, the detected radio emission can trace a range of processes, including a shocked interstellar medium caused by AGN outflows (driven by various mechanisms including radiation pressure, accretion disc winds, and jets). We also describe how interpreting observations in the context of theoretical work can be challenging, in part, due to some of the adopted terminology.

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Section: Coupling Between Energy and Gasmentioning

confidence: 99%

Observational Tests of Active Galactic Nuclei Feedback: An Overview of Approaches and Interpretation

Harrison,

Ramos Almeida

2024

Galaxies

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Multiphase characterization of AGN winds in five local type-2 quasars

Speranza,

Ramos Almeida,

Acosta-Pulido

et al. 2024

A&A

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We present MEGARA integral field unit (IFU) observations of five local type-2 quasars (QSO2s, z $ 0.1$) from the Quasar Feedback (QSOFEED) sample. These active galactic nuclei (AGN) have bolometric luminosities of $ erg s$^ $ and stellar masses of sim 1011 M$_ sun $. The LR-V grating of MEGARA allows us to explore the kinematics of the ionized gas through the O III lambda 5007 AA emission line. The nuclear spectra of the five QSO2s, extracted in a circular aperture of $ (sim 2.2 kpc) in diameter, matching the resolution of these seeing-limited observations, show signatures of high velocity winds in the form of broad (full width at half maximum, 1300leq FWHMleq 2240 and blueshifted components. We found that four out of the five QSO2s present outflows that we can resolve with our seeing-limited data, and they have radii ranging from 3.1 to 12.6 kpc. In the case of the two QSO2s with extended radio emission, we found that it is well aligned with the outflows, suggesting that low-power jets might be compressing and accelerating the ionized gas in these radio-quiet QSO2s. In the four QSO2s with spatially resolved outflows, we measured ionized mass outflow rates of 3.3-6.5 M$_ $ when we used S II -based densities, and of 0.7-1.6 M$_ $ when trans-auroral line-based densities were considered instead. We compared them with the corresponding molecular mass outflow rates (8 - 16 M$_ $), derived from CO(2-1) ALMA observations at 0.2 resolution. The cold molecular outflows carry more mass than their ionized counterparts. However, both phases show lower outflow mass rates than those expected from observational scaling relations where uniform assumptions on the outflow properties were adopted. This might be indicating that the AGN luminosity is not the only driver of massive outflows and/or that these relations need to be rescaled using accurate outflow properties (i.e., electron density and radius). We did not find a significant impact of the outflows on the global star formation rates when considering the energy budget of the molecular and ionized outflows together. However, spatially resolved measurements of recent star formation in these targets are needed in order to evaluate this fairly, considering the dynamical timescales of the outflows, of 3-20 Myr for the ionized gas and 1-10 Myr for the molecular gas.

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AGN-driven outflows in clumpy media: multiphase structure and scaling relations

Ward,

Costa,

Harrison

et al. 2024

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

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Small-scale winds driven from accretion discs surrounding active galactic nuclei (AGN) are expected to launch kpc-scale outflows into their host galaxies. However, the ways in which the structure of the interstellar medium (ISM) affects the multiphase content and impact of the outflow remains uncertain. We present a series of numerical experiments featuring a realistic small-scale AGN wind with velocity $5\times 10^3 - 10^4\rm {\ km\ s^{-1}}$ interacting with an isolated galaxy disc with a manually-controlled clumpy ISM, followed at sub-pc resolution. Our simulations are performed with Arepo and probe a wide range of AGN luminosities ($L_{\rm {AGN}}{=} 10^{43-47}\rm {\ erg\ s^{-1}}$) and ISM substructures. In homogeneous discs, the AGN wind sweeps up an outflowing, cooling shell, where the emerging cold phase dominates the mass and kinetic energy budgets, reaching a momentum flux $\dot{p} \approx 7\ L/c$. However, when the ISM is clumpy, outflow properties are profoundly different. They contain small, long-lived ($\gtrsim 5\ \rm {Myr}$), cold (T ≲ 104.5 K) cloudlets entrained in the faster, hot outflow phase, which are only present in the outflow if radiative cooling is included in the simulation. While the cold phase dominates the mass of the outflow, most of the kinetic luminosity is now carried by a tenuous, hot phase with $T \gtrsim 10^7 \, \rm K$. While the hot phases reaches momentum fluxes $\dot{p} \approx (1 - 5)\ L/c$, energy-driven bubbles couple to the cold phase inefficiently, producing modest momentum fluxes $\dot{p} \lesssim L/c$ in the fast-outflowing cold gas. These low momentum fluxes could lead to the outflows being misclassified as momentum-driven using common observational diagnostics. We also show predictions for scaling relations between outflow properties and AGN luminosity and discuss the challenges in constraining outflow driving mechanisms and kinetic coupling efficiencies using observed quantities.

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Quasar feedback survey: molecular gas affected by central outflows and by ∼10-kpc radio lobes reveal dual feedback effects in ‘radio quiet’ quasars

Cited by 4 publications

References 110 publications

Observational Tests of Active Galactic Nuclei Feedback: An Overview of Approaches and Interpretation

Observational Tests of Active Galactic Nuclei Feedback: An Overview of Approaches and Interpretation

Multiphase characterization of AGN winds in five local type-2 quasars

AGN-driven outflows in clumpy media: multiphase structure and scaling relations

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