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Register a new userVariability of broad absorption lines in a QSO SDSS J022844.09+000217.0 on multi-year timescales
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The variability of the broad absorption lines is investigated for a broad absorption line (BAL) QSO, SDSS J022844.09+000217.0 (z = 2.719), with 18 SDSS/BOSS spectra covering 4128 days in the observed frame. With the ratio of the rms spectrum to the mean spectrum, the relative flux change of the BAL-trough is larger than that of the emission lines and the continuum. Fitting the power-law continuum and the emission line profiles of civ $lambda$1549 and siiv$lambda$1399, we calculate the equivalent width (EW) for different epochs, as well as the continuum luminosity and the spectral index. It is found that there is a strong correlation between the BAL-trough EW and the spectral index, and a weak negative correlation between the BAL-trough EW and the continuum luminosity. The strong correlation between the BAL-trough EW and the spectral index for this one QSO suggests that dust is intrinsic to outflows. The weak correlation between the BAL variability and the continuum luminosity for this one QSO implies that the BAL-trough variation is not dominated by photoionization.
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We present 21 examples of C IV Broad Absorption Line (BAL) trough disappearance in 19 quasars selected from systematic multi-epoch observations of 582 bright BAL quasars (1.9 < z < 4.5) by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey-I/II (SDSS-I/II) and SDSS-III. The observations span 1.1-3.9 yr rest-frame timescales, longer than have been sampled in many previous BAL variability studies. On these timescales, ~2.3% of C IV BAL troughs disappear and ~3.3% of BAL quasars show a disappearing trough. These observed frequencies suggest that many C IV BAL absorbers spend on average at most a century along our line of sight to their quasar. Ten of the 19 BAL quasars showing C IV BAL disappearance have apparently transformed from BAL to non-BAL quasars; these are the first reported examples of such transformations. The BAL troughs that disappear tend to be those with small-to-moderate equivalent widths, relatively shallow depths, and high outflow velocities. Other non-disappearing C IV BALs in those nine objects having multiple troughs tend to weaken when one of them disappears, indicating a connection between the disappearing and non-disappearing troughs, even for velocity separations as large as 10000-15000 km/s. We discuss possible origins of this connection including disk-wind rotation and changes in shielding gas.
We report on the highly variable SiIV and CIV broad absorption lines in SDSS J113831.4+351725.2 across four observational epochs. Using the SiIV doublet components, we find that the blue component is usually saturated and non-black, with the ratio of optical depths between the two components rarely being 2:1. This indicates that these absorbers do not fully cover the line-of-sight and thus a simple apparent optical depth model is insufficient when measuring the true opacity of the absorbers. Tests with inhomogeneous (power-law) and pure-partial coverage (step-function) models of the absorbing SiIV optical depth predict the most un-blended doublets component profiles equally well. However, when testing with Gaussian-fitted doublet components to all SiIV absorbers and averaging the total absorption predicted in each doublet, the upper limit of the power law index is mostly unconstrained. This leads us to favour pure partial coverage as a more accurate measure of the true optical depth than the inhomogeneous power law model. The pure-partial coverage model indicates no significant change in covering fraction across the epochs, with changes in the incident ionizing flux on the absorbing gas instead being favoured as the variability mechanism. This is supported by (a) the coordinated behaviour of the absorption troughs, (b) the behaviour of the continuum at the blue end of the spectrum and (c) the consistency of photoionization simulations of ionic column density dependencies on ionization parameter with the observed variations. Evidence from the simulations together with the CIV absorption profile indicates that the absorber lies outside the broad line region, though the precise distance and kinetic luminosity are not well constrained.
CRTS J084133.15+200525.8 is an optically bright quasar at z=2.345 that has shown extreme spectral variability over the past decade. Photometrically, the source had a visual magnitude of V~17.3 between 2002 and 2008. Then, over the following five years, the source slowly brightened by approximately one magnitude, to V~16.2. Only ~1 in 10,000 quasars show such extreme variability, as quantified by the extreme parameters derived for this quasar assuming a damped random walk model. A combination of archival and newly acquired spectra reveal the source to be an iron low-ionization broad absorption line (FeLoBAL) quasar with extreme changes in its absorption spectrum. Some absorption features completely disappear over the 9 years of optical spectra, while other features remain essentially unchanged. We report the first definitive redshift for this source, based on the detection of broad H-alpha in a Keck/MOSFIRE spectrum. Absorption systems separated by several 1000 km/s in velocity show coordinated weakening in the depths of their troughs as the continuum flux increases. We interpret the broad absorption line variability to be due to changes in photoionization, rather than due to motion of material along our line of sight. This source highlights one sort of rare transition object that astronomy will now be finding through dedicated time-domain surveys.
We report a synchronized kinematic shift of CIV and SiIV broad absorption lines (BAL) in a high-ionization, radio-loud, and X-ray bright quasar SDSS-J092345+512710 (at $z_{em} sim 2.1627$). This quasar shows two broad absorption components (blue component at $v sim 14,000 km s^{-1}$, and red component at $v sim 4,000 km s^{-1}$ with respect to the quasars systemic redshift). The absorption profiles of CIV and SiIV BAL of the blue component show decrease in outflow velocity with an average deceleration rate of $-1.62_{-0.05}^{+0.04} cm s^{-2}$ and $-1.14^{+0.21}_{-0.22} cm s^{-2}$ over a rest-frame time-span of 4.15 yr. We do not see any acceleration-like signature in the red component. This is consistent with dramatic variabilities usually seen at high velocities. During our monitoring period the quasar has shown no strong continuum variability. We suggest the observed variability could be related to the time dependent changes in disk wind parameters like launching radius, initial flow velocity or mass outflow rate.
We exploit the widely-separated images of the lensed quasar SDSS J1029+2623 ($z_{em}$=2.197, $theta =22^{primeprime}!!.5$) to observe its outflowing wind through two different sightlines. We present an analysis of three observations, including two with the Subaru telescope in 2010 February (Misawa et al. 2013) and 2014 April (Misawa et al. 2014), separated by 4 years, and one with the Very Large Telescope, separated from the second Subaru observation by $sim$2 months. We detect 66 narrow absorption lines (NALs), of which 24 are classified as intrinsic NALs that are physically associated with the quasar based on partial coverage analysis. The velocities of intrinsic NALs appear to cluster around values of $v_{ej}$ $sim$ 59,000, 43,000, and 29,000 km/s, which is reminiscent of filamentary structures obtained by numerical simulations. There are no common intrinsic NALs at the same redshift along the two sightlines, implying that the transverse size of the NAL absorbers should be smaller than the sightline distance between two lensed images. In addition to the NALs with large ejection velocities of $v_{ej}$ > 1,000 km/s, we also detect broader proximity absorption lines (PALs) at $z_{abs}$ $sim$ $z_{em}$. The PALs are likely to arise in outflowing gas at a distance of r $leq$ 620 pc from the central black hole with an electron density of $n_e$ $geq$ 8.7$times$10$^{3}$ cm$^{-3}$. These limits are based on the assumption that the variability of the lines is due to recombination. We discuss the implications of these results on the three-dimensional structure of the outflow.
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