No Arabic abstract
Cold quasars are a rare subpopulation observed to host unobscured, X-ray luminous active galactic nuclei (AGN) while also retaining a cold gas supply fueling high star formation rates. These objects are interpreted as AGN early in their evolution. We present new SOFIA HAWC+ far-infrared observations, FUV-FIR photometry, and optical spectroscopy to characterize the accretion and star formation behavior in a cold quasar at z ~ 0.405 (CQ 4479). CQ 4479 is a starburst galaxy with a predominantly young stellar population and a high gas mass fraction of ~50-70%. The AGN component has yet to become the dominant component of the FIR emission. We also find AGN bolometric luminosity that varies as a function of observation method and AGN region probed. Finally, we identify a candidate outflow feature corroborating the hypothesis that cold quasars have energetic feedback. This object presents an intriguing look into the early stages of AGN feedback and probes the rare phase where an AGN and cold gaseous component co-exist.
We present the results of optical spectroscopy for 19 quasar candidates at photometric redshifts $zphot gtrsim 3$, Nobs of which enter into the Khorunzhev et al.~(2016) catalog (K16). This is a catalog of quasar candidates and known type 1 quasars selected among the X-ray sources of the textit{3XMM-DR4}catalog of the XMM-Newton serendipitous survey. We have performed spectroscopy for a quasi-random sample of new candidates at the 1.6-m Azt telescope of the Sayan Solar Observatory and the 6-m BTA telescope of the Special Astrophysical Observatory. The spectra at Azt were taken with the new low- and medium-resolution ADAM spectrograph that was produced and installed on the telescope in 2015. Fourteen of the Nobs candidates actually have turned out to be quasars; 10 of them are at spectroscopic redshifts z > 3. The high purity of the sample of new candidates suggests that the purity of the entire K16 catalog of quasars is probably 70--80%. One of the most distant ($zspec=5.08$) optically bright ($i^primelesssim 21$) quasars ever detected in X-ray surveys has been discovered.
We searched for high-z quasars within the X-ray source population detected in the contiguous $sim 140^2$ eFEDS field observed by eROSITA during the performance verification phase. We collected the available spectroscopic information in the field, including the sample of all currently known optically selected z>5.5 quasars and cross-matched secure Legacy DR8 counterparts of eROSITA-detected X-ray point-like sources with this spectroscopic sample. We report the X-ray detection of an eROSITA source securely matched to the well-known quasar SDSS J083643.85+005453.3 (z=5.81). The soft X-ray flux of the source derived from eROSITA is consistent with previous Chandra observations. In addition, we report the detection of the quasar with LOFAR at 145 MHz and ASKAP at 888 MHz. The reported flux densities confirm a spectral flattening at lower frequencies in the emission of the radio core, indicating that the quasar could be a (sub-) gigahertz peaked spectrum source. The inferred spectral shape and the parsec-scale radio morphology of SDSS J083643.85+005453.3 suggest that it is in an early stage of its evolution into a large-scale radio source or confined in a dense environment. We find no indications for a strong jet contribution to the X-ray emission of the quasar, which is therefore likely to be linked to accretion processes. The detection of this source allows us to place the first constraints on the XLF at z>5.5 based on a secure spectroscopic redshift. Compared to extrapolations from lower-redshift observations, this favours a relatively flat slope for the XLF at $zsim 6$ beyond $L_*$. The population of X-ray luminous AGNs at high redshift may be larger than previously thought. From our XLF constraints, we make the conservative prediction that eROSITA will detect $sim 90$ X-ray luminous AGNs at redshifts 5.7<z<6.4 in the full-sky survey (De+RU).
We present multi-wavelength observations (from optical to sub-millimeter, including Spitzer and SCUBA) of H2XMMJ 003357.2-120038 (also GD158_19), an X-ray selected, luminous narrow-line (Type 2) quasar at z=1.957 selected from the HELLAS2XMM survey. Its broad-band properties can be reasonably well modeled assuming three components: a stellar component to account for the optical and near-IR emission, an AGN component (i.e., dust heated by an accreting active nucleus), dominant in the mid-IR, with an optical depth at 9.7 micron along the line of sight (close to the equatorial plane of the obscuring matter) of tau(9.7)=1 and a full covering angle of the reprocessing matter (torus) of 140 degrees, and a far-IR starburst component (i.e., dust heated by star formation) to reproduce the wide bump observed longward of 70 micron. The derived star-formation rate is about 1500 solar masses per year. The overall modeling indicates that GD158_19 is a high-redshift X-ray luminous, obscured quasar with coeval powerful AGN activity and intense star formation. It is probably caught before the process of expelling the obscuring gas has started, thus quenching the star formation.
We present the discovery and properties of DESJ014132.4-542749.9 (DES0141-54), a new powerful radio-loud active galactic nucleus (AGN) in the early Universe (z=5.0). It was discovered by cross-matching the first data release of the Dark Energy Survey (DES DR1) with the Sidney University Molonglo Survey (SUMSS) radio catalog at 0.843 GHz. This object is the first radio-loud AGN at high redshift discovered in the DES. The radio properties of DES0141-54, namely its very large radio-loudness (R>10$^{4}$), the high radio luminosity (L$_{0.8 GHz}$=1.73$times$10$^{28}$ W Hz$^{-1}$), and the flatness of the radio spectrum ($alpha$=0.35) up to very high frequencies (120 GHz in the sources rest frame), classify this object as a blazar, meaning, a radio-loud AGN observed along the relativistic jet axis. However, the X--ray luminosity of DESJ0141-54 is much lower compared to those of the high redshift (z$geq$4.5) blazars discovered so far. Moreover its X-ray-to-radio luminosity ratio (log($frac{L_{[0.5-10]keV}}{L_{1.4GHz}}$)=9.96$pm$0.30 Hz) is small also when compared to lower redshift blazars: only 2% of the low-z population has a similar ratio. By modeling the spectral energy distribution we found that this peculiar X--ray weakness and the powerful radio emission could be related to a particularly high value of the magnetic field. Finally, the mass of the central black hole is relatively small (M$_{BH}$ = 3-8 $times$10$^8$ M$_{odot}$) compared to other confirmed blazars at similar redshift, making DES0141-54 the radio-loud AGN that host the smallest supermassive black hole ever discovered at z$geq$5.
In active galactic nuclei (AGN)-galaxy co-evolution models, AGN winds and outflows are often invoked to explain why super-massive black holes and galaxies stop growing efficiently at a certain phase of their lives. They are commonly referred to as the leading actors of feedback processes. Evidence of ultra-fast (v>0.05c) outflows in the innermost regions of AGN has been collected in the past decade by sensitive X-ray observations for sizable samples of AGN, mostly at low redshift. Here we present ultra-deep XMM-Newton and Chandra spectral data of an obscured (Nh~2x10^{23} cm^-2), intrinsically luminous (L2-10keV~4x10^{44} erg/s) quasar (named PID352) at z~1.6 (derived from the X-ray spectral analysis) in the Chandra Deep Field-South. The source is characterized by an iron emission and absorption line complex at observed energies of E~2-3 keV. While the emission line is interpreted as being due to neutral iron (consistent with the presence of cold absorption), the absorption feature is due to highly ionized iron transitions (FeXXV, FeXXVI) with an outflowing velocity of 0.14^{+0.02}_{-0.06}c, as derived from photoionization models. The mass outflow rate - ~2 Msun/yr - is similar to the source accretion rate, and the derived mechanical energy rate is ~9.5x10^{44} erg/s, corresponding to 9% of the source bolometric luminosity. PID352 represents one of the few cases where indications of X-ray outflowing gas have been observed at high redshift thus far. This wind is powerful enough to provide feedback on the host galaxy.