No Arabic abstract
We investigate the effect of active galactic nucleus (AGN) variability on the observed connection between star formation and black hole accretion in extragalactic surveys. Recent studies have reported relatively weak correlations between observed AGN luminosities and the properties of AGN hosts, which has been interpreted to imply that there is no direct connection between AGN activity and star formation. However, AGNs may be expected to vary significantly on a wide range of timescales (from hours to Myr) that are far shorter than the typical timescale for star formation (>~100 Myr). This variability can have important consequences for observed correlations. We present a simple model in which all star-forming galaxies host an AGN when averaged over ~100 Myr timescales, with long-term average AGN accretion rates that are perfectly correlated with the star formation rate (SFR). We show that reasonable prescriptions for AGN variability reproduce the observed weak correlations between SFR and L_AGN in typical AGN host galaxies, as well as the general trends in the observed AGN luminosity functions, merger fractions, and measurements of the average AGN luminosity as a function of SFR. These results imply there may be a tight connection between AGN activity and SFR over galaxy evolution timescales, and that the apparent similarities in rest-frame colors, merger rates, and clustering of AGNs compared to inactive galaxies may be due primarily to AGN variability. The results provide motivation for future deep, wide extragalactic surveys that can measure the distribution of AGN accretion rates as a function of SFR.
There exist strong evidence supporting the co-evolution of central supermassive black holes and their host galaxies. It is however still unclear what the exact role of nuclear activity, in the form of accretion onto these supermassive black holes, in this co-evolution is. We use a rich multi-wavelength dataset available for the North Ecliptic Pole field, most notably surveyed by the AKARI satellite infrared telescope to study the host galaxy properties of AGN. In particular we are interested in investigating star-formation in the host galaxies of radio-AGN and the putative radio feedback mechanism, potentially responsible for the eventual quenching of star-formation. Using both broadband SED modeling and optical spectroscopy, we simultaneously study the nu- clear and host galaxy components of our sources, as a function of their radio luminosity, bolo- metric luminosity, and radio-loudness. Here we present preliminary results concerning the AGN content of the radio sources in this field, while offering tentative evidence that jets are inefficient star-formation quenchers, except in their most powerful state.
Using a sample of 229618 narrow emission-line galaxies, we have determined the normal star formation histories (SFHs) for galaxies with different activity types: star forming galaxies (SFGs), transition type objects (TOs), Seyfert 2s (Sy2s) and LINERs. We find that the variation of the SFH with the activity type is explained by the mass of the galaxies and the importance of their bulge: the LINERs reside in massive early-type galaxies, the Sy2s and TOs are hosted by intermediate mass galaxies with intermediate morphological types, and the SFGs are found in lower mass late-type spirals. Except for the Sy2s, the more massive galaxies formed the bulk of their stars more rapidly than the less massive ones. The Sy2s formed their stars more slowly and show presently an excess in star formation. We have also found that the maximum in star formation rate in the past increases with the virial mass within the aperture (VMA), the VMA increasing from the SFGs to the TOs, to the Sy2s, culminating in the LINERs. This correlation suggests that the bulges and the supermassive black holes at the center of galaxies grow in parallel, in good agreement with the M(BH)-sigma relation.
We present a measurement of the average supermassive black hole accretion rate (BHAR) as a function of star formation rate (SFR) for galaxies in the redshift range 0.25<z<0.8. We study a sample of 1,767 far-IR selected star-forming galaxies in the 9 deg^2 Bootes multiwavelength survey field. The SFR is estimated using 250 micron observations from the Herschel Space Observatory, for which the contribution from the AGN is minimal. In this sample, 121 AGNs are directly identified using X-ray or mid-IR selection criteria. We combined these detected AGNs and an X-ray stacking analysis for undetected sources to study the average BHAR for all of the star-forming galaxies in our sample. We find an almost linear relation between the average BHAR (in M_sun/year) and the SFR (in M_sun/year) for galaxies across a wide SFR range 0.85<log SFR<2.56 : log BHAR=(-3.72pm0.52)+(1.05pm0.33) log SFR. This global correlation between SFR and average BHAR is consistent with a simple picture in which SFR and AGN activity are tightly linked over galaxy evolution timescales.
We post-process galaxy star formation histories in cosmological hydrodynamics simulations to test quenching mechanisms associated with AGN. By comparing simulation results to color-magnitude diagrams and luminosity functions of SDSS galaxies, we examine whether quasar mode or radio mode AGN feedback can yield a realistic red sequence. Both cases yield red sequences distinct from the blue cloud, decent matches to the luminosity function, and galaxies that are too blue by about 0.1 magnitudes in g-r. Our merger-based prescription for quasar mode feedback, however, yields a red sequence build-up inconsistent with observations: the luminosity function lacks a characteristic knee, and the brightest galaxies include a small number of young stars.
We investigate the location of an ultra-hard X-ray selected sample of AGN from the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) catalog with respect to the main sequence (MS) of star-forming galaxies using Herschel-based measurements of the star formation rate (SFR) and stellar mass (mstar) from Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) photometry where the AGN contribution has been carefully removed. We construct the MS with galaxies from the Herschel Reference Survey and Herschel Stripe 82 Survey using the exact same methods to measure the SFR and mstar{} as the Swift/BAT AGN. We find a large fraction of the Swift/BAT AGN lie below the MS indicating decreased specific SFR (sSFR) compared to non-AGN galaxies. The Swift/BAT AGN are then compared to a high-mass galaxy sample (COLD GASS), where we find a similarity between the AGN in COLD GASS and the Swift/BAT AGN. Both samples of AGN lie firmly between star-forming galaxies on the MS and quiescent galaxies far below the MS. However, we find no relationship between the X-ray luminosity and distance from the MS. While the morphological distribution of the BAT AGN is more similar to star-forming galaxies, the sSFR of each morphology is more similar to the COLD GASS AGN. The merger fraction in the BAT AGN is much higher than the COLD GASS AGN and star-forming galaxies and is related to distance from the MS. These results support a model in which bright AGN tend to be in high mass star-forming galaxies in the process of quenching which eventually starves the supermassive black hole itself.