THE LICK AGN MONITORING PROJECT 2011: DYNAMICAL MODELING OF THE BROAD-LINE REGION IN Mrk 50

Pancoast, Anna; Brewer, Brendon J.; Treu, Tommaso; Barth, Aaron J.; Bennert, Vardha N.; Canalizo, Gabriela; Filippenko, A. V.; Gates, E. L.; Greene, Jenny E.; Li, Weidong; Malkan, Matthew A.; Sand, David J.; Stern, Daniel; Woo, J. H.; Assef, Roberto J.; Bae, Hyun‐Jin; Buehler, Tabitha; Cenko, S. Bradley; Clubb, K. I.; Cooper, Michael C.; Diamond‐Stanic, Aleksandar M.; Hiner, Kyle D.; Hönig, S. F.; Joner, M. D.; Kandrashoff, M. T.; Laney, C. D.; Lazarova, Mariana; Nierenberg, Anna; Park, Dawoo; Silverman, J. M.; Son, Donghoon; Sonnenfeld, Alessandro; Thorman, Shawn J.; Tollerud, Erik; Walsh, Jonelle L.; Walters, Richard

doi:10.1088/0004-637x/754/1/49

Cited by 81 publications

(97 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…By using Bayesian probability theory and Monte Carlo algorithms, Pancoast et al (2011) presented a general method for geometric and dynamical modelling of the BLR. Using this method, Brewer et al (2011) and Pancoast et al (2012) modelled the geometry and estimated the BH mass for the Seyfert 1 galaxies Arp 151 and Mrk 50. In both studies evidence for a disk-like BLR geometry was found.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling photometric reverberation data: a disk-like broad-line region and a potentially larger black hole mass for 3C 120

Núñez

Haas

Ramolla

et al. 2014

A&A

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We consider photometric reverberation mapping, where the nuclear continuum variations are monitored via a broad-band filter and the echo of emission line clouds of the broad-line region (BLR) is measured with a suitable narrow-band (NB) filter. We investigate how an incomplete emission-line coverage by the NB filter influences the determination of the BLR size. This includes two basic cases: 1) a symmetric cut of the blue and red part of the line wings; and 2) the filter positioned asymmetrically to the line centre so that essentially a complete half of the emission line is contained in the NB filter. Under the assumption that the BLR is dominated by circular Keplerian orbits, we find that symmetric cutting of line wings may lead to overestimating the BLR size by less than 5%. The case of asymmetric half-line coverage, similar as for our data of the Seyfert 1 galaxy 3C 120, yields a BLR size with a bias of less than 1%. Our results suggest that any BLR size bias due to a narrow-band line cut in photometric reverberation mapping is small and in most cases negligible. We used well-sampled photometric reverberation mapping light curves with sharp variation features in both the continuum and the Hβ light curves to determine the geometry type of the Hβ BLR for 3C 120. Modelling of the light curve, under the assumption that the BLR is essentially virialised, argues against a spherical geometry and favours a nearly face-on disk-like geometry with an inclination i = 10 • ± 4 • and an extension from 22 to 28 light days. The low inclination may lead to a larger black hole mass M BH than that derived when using the average geometry scaling factor f = 5.5. We discuss deviations of Seyfert 1 galaxies from the M BH -σ * relation.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling photometric reverberation data: a disk-like broad-line region and a potentially larger black hole mass for 3C 120

Núñez

Haas

Ramolla

et al. 2014

A&A

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“…This allows to make a measurement of the black hole mass that does not depend on the virial coefficient (Pancoast et al, , 2012. The accuracy of the black hole mass estimates with this method has been significantly improved (Barth et al, 2011;Pancoast et al, 2012;Li et al, 2013). The preliminary results show that five black hole masses have been measured at an uncertainty of ∼ 0.2 − 0.4 dex depending upon data quality with this method (Pancoast et al, 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…Recently, Pancoast et al (2011) proposed a method to analyze reverberation mapping data, with which the geometry and kinematics of the BLR can be well constrained by modeling the continuum light curve and broad line profiles directly with the velocity resolved broad line data. This allows to make a measurement of the black hole mass that does not depend on the virial coefficient (Pancoast et al, , 2012. The accuracy of the black hole mass estimates with this method has been significantly improved (Barth et al, 2011;Pancoast et al, 2012;Li et al, 2013).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Constraints on black hole spins with a general relativistic accretion disk corona model

You

Cao

Yuan

2016

Res. Astron. Astrophys.

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The peaks of the spectra of the accretion disks surrounding massive black holes in quasars are in the far-UV or soft X-ray band, which are usually not observed. However, in the disk corona model, the soft photons from the disk are Comptonized to high energy in the hot corona, and the hard X-ray spectra (luminosity and spectral shape) contain the information of the incident spectra from the disk. The values of black hole spin parameter a * are inferred from the spectral fitting, which spread over a large range, ∼ −0.94 to 0.998. We find that the inclination angles and mass accretion rates are well determined by the spectral fitting, while the results are sensitive to the accuracy of black hole mass estimates. No tight constraints on the black hole spins are achieved, if the uncertainties of black hole mass measurements are a factor of four, which are typical for the single-epoch reverberation mapping method. Recently, the accuracy of black hole mass measurement has been significantly improved to 0.2 − 0.4 dex with velocity resolved reverberation mapping method (Pancoast et al., 2014). The black hole spin can be well constrained if the mass measurement accuracy is < ∼ 50%. In the accretion disk corona scenario, a fraction of power dissipated in the disk is transported into the corona, and therefore the accretion disk is thinner than a bare disk for the same mass accretion rate, because the radiation pressure in the disk is reduced. We find that the thin disk approximation, H/R < ∼ 0.1, is still valid if 0.3 <ṁ < 0.5, provided a half of the dissipated power is radiated in the corona above the disk.

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“…These types of programs will or already are leading to RM-based mass measurements that are independent of other methods (i.e., do not depend on f ). I show a couple examples of the products from these types of analyses in In a similar, though effectively opposite approach, the Bayesian analysis software of Pancoast et al [26] uses dynamical models of the BLR with possible geometries in combination with the reverberation campaign spectra and light curves to derive the BH mass and constrain the BLR geometry (see Figure 3). This modeling process can also output the 2D velocity delay map as a product, but more importantly, this dynamical modeling results in an independent estimate of the black hole mass, i.e., one that does not depend on f .…”

Section: Recent Advances In Reverberation Mapping Analyses: Velocity mentioning

confidence: 99%

Reverberation Mapping: Masses and Distance and Size, Oh My!

Denney¹

2014

Proceedings of Frank N. Bash Symposium 2013: New Horizons in Astronomy — PoS(BASH 2013)

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I review the technique of reverberation mapping and describe its use in the direct, dynamical mass measurement of actively accreting supermassive black holes located at the centers of active galactic nuclei (AGN). I discuss continued challenges to this method that current and planned observations are working to overcome. I also present some additional applications of the reverberation mapping measurements, discussing how reverberation time delays used to probe the size of the broad line-emitting region not only allow for these direct mass measurements, but also, through empirically calibrated scaling relationships, provide a method for indirect mass estimates of black holes in large samples of distant quasars. Furthermore, these broad-line region size measurements also have the potential to turn AGN into cosmic distance probes, as the measured size of this region scales with intrinsic AGN luminosity. With regard to these applications, I address some of the continuing sources of systematic uncertainties with which I am currently concerned, as well as work that is being done in an attempt to understand and mitigate these systematics.

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THE LICK AGN MONITORING PROJECT 2011: DYNAMICAL MODELING OF THE BROAD-LINE REGION IN Mrk 50

Cited by 81 publications

References 40 publications

Modelling photometric reverberation data: a disk-like broad-line region and a potentially larger black hole mass for 3C 120

Modelling photometric reverberation data: a disk-like broad-line region and a potentially larger black hole mass for 3C 120

Constraints on black hole spins with a general relativistic accretion disk corona model

Reverberation Mapping: Masses and Distance and Size, Oh My!

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