Browsing by Author "Asmus, D."

Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
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    A New Compton-thick AGN in Our Cosmic Backyard: Unveiling the Buried Nucleus in NGC 1448 with NuSTAR
    (2017) Annuar, A.; Alexander, D.; Gandhi, P.; Lansbury, G.; Asmus, D.; Ballantyne, D.; Bauer, Franz Erik; Boggs, S.; Boorman, P.; Brandt W.; Brightman, M.|Christensen, F.; Craig, W.; Farrah, D.; Goulding, A.; Hailey, C.; Harrison, F.; Koss, M.; Lamassa, S.; Murray, S.; Ricci, Claudio; Rosario, D.; Stanley, F.; Stern, D.; Zhang, W.
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    BASS. XLII. The Relation between the Covering Factor of Dusty Gas and the Eddington Ratio in Nearby Active Galactic Nuclei
    Ricci, C.; Ichikawa, K.; Stalevski, M.; Kawamuro, T.; Yamada, S.; Ueda, Y.; Mushotzky, R.; Privon, G. C.; Koss, M. J.; Trakhtenbrot, B.; Fabian, A. C.; Ho, L. C.; Asmus, D.; Bauer, Franz Erik; Chang, C. S.; Gupta, K. K.; Oh, K.; Powell, M.; Pfeifle, R. W.; Rojas, A.; Ricci, F.; Temple, M. J.; Toba, Y.; Tortosa, A.; Treister, Ezequiel; Harrison, F.; Stern, D.; Urry, C. M.
    Accreting supermassive black holes (SMBHs) located at the centers of galaxies are typically surrounded by large quantities of gas and dust. The structure and evolution of this circumnuclear material can be studied at different wavelengths, from the submillimeter to the X-ray. Recent X-ray studies have shown that the covering factor of the obscuring material tends to decrease with increasing Eddington ratio, likely due to radiative feedback on dusty gas. Here we study a sample of 549 nearby (z less than or similar to 0.1) hard X-ray (14-195 keV) selected nonblazar active galactic nuclei (AGN) and use the ratio between the AGN infrared and bolometric luminosity as a proxy of the covering factor. We find that, in agreement with what has been found by X-ray studies of the same sample, the covering factor decreases with increasing Eddington ratio. We also confirm previous findings that showed that obscured AGN typically have larger covering factors than unobscured sources. Finally, we find that the median covering factors of AGN located in different regions of the column density-Eddington ratio diagram are in good agreement with what would be expected from a radiation-regulated growth of SMBHs.
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    NGC 1068: No change in the mid-infrared torus structure despite X-ray variability
    (2017) Lopez-Gonzaga, N.; Asmus, D.; Bauer, Franz Erik; Tristam, K.; Burstcher, L.; Marinucci, A.; Matt, G.; Harrison, F.
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    NuSTAR observations of four nearby X-ray faint AGNs: low luminosity or heavy obscuration?
    (OUP, 2020) Annuar, A.; Alexander, D. M.; Gandhi, P.; Lansbury, G. B.; Asmus, D.; Balokovic, M.; Ballantyne, D. R.; Bauer, Franz Erik; Boorman, P. G.; Brandt, W. N.; Brightman, M.; Chen, C. T. J.; Del Moro, A.; Farrah, D.; Harrison, F. A.; Koss, M. J.; Lanz, L.; Marchesi, S.; Masini, A.; Nardini, E.; Ricci, Claudio; Stern, D.; Zappacosta, L.
    We present NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array) observations of four active galactic nuclei (AGNs) located within 15 Mpc. These AGNs, namely ESO 121-G6, NGC 660, NGC 3486, and NGC 5195, have observed X-ray luminosities of L 2–10 keV,obs ≲ 10 39 erg s −1 , classifying them as low-luminosity AGN (LLAGN). We perform broad-band X-ray spectral analysis for the AGN by combining our NuSTAR data with Chandra or XMM–Newton observations to directly measure their column densities (N H ) and infer their intrinsic power. We complement our X-ray data with archival and new high-angular resolution mid-infrared (mid-IR) data for all objects, except NGC 5195. Based on our X-ray spectral analysis, we found that both ESO 121-G6 and NGC 660 are heavily obscured (N H > 10 23 cm −2 ; L 2–10 keV,int ∼ 10 41 erg s −1 ), and NGC 660 may be Compton thick. We also note that the X-ray flux and spectral slope for ESO 121-G6 have significantly changed over the last decade, indicating significant changes in the obscuration and potentially accretion rate. On the other hand, NGC 3486 and NGC 5195 appear to be unobscured and just mildly obscured, respectively, with L 2–10 keV,int < 10 39 erg s −1 , i.e. genuine LLAGN. Both of the heavily obscured AGNs have L bol > 10 41 erg s −1 and λ Edd ≳ 10 −3 , and are detected in high-angular resolution mid-IR imaging, indicating the presence of obscuring dust on nuclear scale. NGC 3486, however, is undetected in high-resolution mid-IR imaging, and the current data do not provide stringent constraints on the presence or absence of obscuring nuclear dust in the AGN.
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    NuSTAR Observations of WISE J1036+0449, a Galaxy at z~1 Obscured by Hot Dust.
    (2017) Ricci, Claudio; Bauer, Franz Erik; Treister, Ezequiel; Nikutta, R.; Assef T., Roberto; Stern, D.; Alexander, D. M.; Asmus, D.; Ballantyne, D. R.; Blain, A. W.; Boggs, Steven E.