scholarly journals Forward modelling the multiwavelength properties of active galactic nuclei: application to X-ray and WISE mid-infrared samples

2020 ◽  
Vol 499 (1) ◽  
pp. 710-729
Author(s):  
Antonis Georgakakis ◽  
Angel Ruiz ◽  
Stephanie M LaMassa

ABSTRACT An empirical forward-modelling framework is developed to interpret the multiwavelength properties of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and provide insights into the overlap and incompleteness of samples selected at different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum. The core of the model are observationally derived probabilites on the occupation of galaxies by X-ray-selected AGN. These are used to seed mock galaxies drawn from stellar-mass functions with accretion events and then associate them with spectral energy distributions that describe both the stellar and AGN emission components. This approach is used to study the complementarity between X-ray and WISE mid-infrared AGN selection methods. We first show that the basic observational properties of the X-ray and WISE AGN (magnitude and redshift distributions) are adequately reproduced by the model. We then infer the level of contamination of the WISE selection and show that this is dominated by non-AGN at redshifts z < 0.5. These are star-forming galaxies that scatter into the WISE AGN selection wedge because of photometric uncertainties affecting their colours. Our baseline model shows a sharp drop in the number density of heavily obscured AGN above the Compton-thick limit in the WISE bands. The model also overpredicts by a factor of 1.5 the fraction of X-ray associations in the WISE AGN selection box compared to observations. This suggests a population of X-ray faint sources that is not reproduced by the model. This discrepancy is discussed in the context of either heavily obscured or intrinsically X-ray weak AGN. Evidence is found in favour of the latter.

2004 ◽  
Vol 128 (5) ◽  
pp. 2048-2065 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. E. Bauer ◽  
D. M. Alexander ◽  
W. N. Brandt ◽  
D. P. Schneider ◽  
E. Treister ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (S341) ◽  
pp. 21-25
Author(s):  
M. J. I. Brown ◽  
K. J. Duncan ◽  
H. Landt ◽  
M. Kirk ◽  
C. Ricci ◽  
...  

AbstarctWe present ongoing work on the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of active galactic nuclei (AGNs), derived from X-ray, ultraviolet, optical, infrared and radio photometry and spectroscopy. Our work is motivated by new wide-field imaging surveys that will identify vast numbers of AGNs, and by the need to benchmark AGN SED fitting codes. We have constructed 41 SEDs of individual AGNs and 80 additional SEDs that mimic Seyfert spectra. All of our SEDs span 0.09 to 30μm, while some extend into the X-ray and/or radio. We have tested the utility of the SEDs by using them to generate AGN photometric redshifts, and they outperform SEDs from the prior literature, including reduced redshift errors and flux density residuals.


2020 ◽  
Vol 494 (2) ◽  
pp. 2538-2560 ◽  
Author(s):  
J M M Neustadt ◽  
T W-S Holoien ◽  
C S Kochanek ◽  
K Auchettl ◽  
J S Brown ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT We present the discovery of ASASSN-18jd (AT 2018bcb), a luminous optical/ultraviolet(UV)/X-ray transient located in the nucleus of the galaxy 2MASX J22434289–1659083 at z = 0.1192. Over the year after discovery, Swift UltraViolet and Optical Telescope (UVOT) photometry shows the UV spectral energy distribution of the transient to be well modelled by a slowly shrinking blackbody with temperature $T \sim 2.5 \times 10^{4} \, {\rm K}$, a maximum observed luminosity of $L_{\rm max} = 4.5^{+0.6}_{-0.3}\times 10^{44} \, {\rm erg \,s}^{-1}$, and a radiated energy of $E = 9.6^{+1.1}_{-0.6} \times 10^{51} \, {\rm erg}$. X-ray data from Swift X-Ray Telescope (XRT) and XMM–Newton show a transient, variable X-ray flux with blackbody and power-law components that fade by nearly an order of magnitude over the following year. Optical spectra show strong, roughly constant broad Balmer emission and transient features attributable to He ii, N iii–v, O iii, and coronal Fe. While ASASSN-18jd shares similarities with tidal disruption events (TDEs), it is also similar to the newly discovered nuclear transients seen in quiescent galaxies and faint active galactic nuclei (AGNs).


2020 ◽  
Vol 497 (1) ◽  
pp. 482-497
Author(s):  
Mai Liao ◽  
Minfeng Gu ◽  
Minhua Zhou ◽  
Liang Chen

ABSTRACT In this work, we investigated the X-ray emission for a sample of young radio active galactic nuclei (AGNs) by combining data from Chandra/XMM–Newton with data for other wavebands. We find strong correlations between the X-ray luminosity LX at 2–10 keV and the radio luminosities LR at 5 GHz for the VLBI radio-core, VLA radio-core and Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters (FIRST) component, indicating that both parsec- and kiloparsec-scale radio emissions are strongly correlated with X-ray emission in these sources. We find an approximately linear dependence of the radio on the X-ray luminosity in the sources with radiatively efficient accretion flows (i.e. the Eddington ratio Redd ≳ 10−3), with b ∼ 1 ($L_{\rm R}\, \propto \, L_{\rm X} ^{b}$) and $\xi _{\rm RX}\, \sim$ 1 in the fundamental plane using the VLBI data. The dependence is consistent with the re-analysed results of a previous study of Fan and Bai at Redd ≳ 10−3, but is significantly different from the theoretical prediction of accretion flow as the origin of X-ray emission. In contrast to the case for radio-quiet quasars, there is no significant correlation between Γ and the Eddington ratio. Our results seem to indicate that the X-ray emission of high-accretion young radio AGNs may be from the jet. We constructed the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) for 18 sources (most of which are in radiatively efficient accretion), namely nine galaxies and nine quasars with high-quality X-ray data, and find that the X-ray emission of most quasars is more luminous than that of normal radio-quiet quasars. This is clearly seen from the quasar composite SED, in which the X-ray emission is apparently higher than that of radio-quiet quasars, probably supporting jet-related X-ray emission in young radio AGNs. The possibility that the X-ray emission is from self-synchrotron Compton is discussed.


2008 ◽  
Vol 680 (1) ◽  
pp. 130-142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolin N. Cardamone ◽  
C. Megan Urry ◽  
Maaike Damen ◽  
Pieter van Dokkum ◽  
Ezequiel Treister ◽  
...  

2015 ◽  
Vol 454 (1) ◽  
pp. 766-803 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Asmus ◽  
P. Gandhi ◽  
S. F. Hönig ◽  
A. Smette ◽  
W. J. Duschl

2011 ◽  
Vol 729 (1) ◽  
pp. 22 ◽  
Author(s):  
David W. Atlee ◽  
Paul Martini ◽  
Roberto J. Assef ◽  
Daniel D. Kelson ◽  
John S. Mulchaey

2019 ◽  
Vol 489 (1) ◽  
pp. 663-680 ◽  
Author(s):  
M Brescia ◽  
M Salvato ◽  
S Cavuoti ◽  
T T Ananna ◽  
G Riccio ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT With the launch of eROSITA (extended Roentgen Survey with an Imaging Telescope Array), successfully occurred on 2019 July 13, we are facing the challenge of computing reliable photometric redshifts for 3 million of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) over the entire sky, having available only patchy and inhomogeneous ancillary data. While we have a good understanding of the photo-z quality obtainable for AGN using spectral energy distribution (SED)-fitting technique, we tested the capability of machine learning (ML), usually reliable in computing photo-z for QSO in wide and shallow areas with rich spectroscopic samples. Using MLPQNA as example of ML, we computed photo-z for the X-ray-selected sources in Stripe 82X, using the publicly available photometric and spectroscopic catalogues. Stripe 82X is at least as deep as eROSITA will be and wide enough to include also rare and bright AGNs. In addition, the availability of ancillary data mimics what can be available in the whole sky. We found that when optical, and near- and mid-infrared data are available, ML and SED fitting perform comparably well in terms of overall accuracy, realistic redshift probability density functions, and fraction of outliers, although they are not the same for the two methods. The results could further improve if the photometry available is accurate and including morphological information. Assuming that we can gather sufficient spectroscopy to build a representative training sample, with the current photometry coverage we can obtain reliable photo-z for a large fraction of sources in the Southern hemisphere well before the spectroscopic follow-up, thus timely enabling the eROSITA science return. The photo-z catalogue is released here.


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