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Register a new userThe Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment. A Hunt for Caustic Crossings in QSO 2237+0305
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P.R. Wozniak
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In 1998 The Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE) successfully implemented automated data reductions for QSO 2237+0305. Using a new image subtraction method we achieved a differential photometry scatter of 1-5 % for images A-D respectively. Combined with a time sampling of 1-2 times a week this is sufficient for early detection of caustic crossings. Nearly real time photometry of QSO 2237+0305 is available from the OGLE web site http://www.astro.princeton.edu/~ogle/ogle2/huchra.html . During the 1999 observing season, the apparent V magnitude of the A, B, C and D images changed by 0.50, 0.15, 0.65 and 0.35 mag, respectively. Most likely however, none of the microlensing events involved a caustic crossing. The most rapid variation was 0.25 mag in 30 days, observed for image C. The alert system will continue to be active in the next observing season from late April until September 2000, when OGLE suspends operation for an upgrade. Observations will resume for season of 2001.
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We present results from 2 years of monitoring of Huchras lens (QSO 2237+0305) with the 1.3 m Warsaw telescope on Las Campanas, Chile. Photometry in the V band was done using a newly developed method for image subtraction. Reliable subtraction without Fourier division removes all complexities associated with the presence of a bright lensing galaxy. With positions of lensed images adopted from HST measurements it is relatively easy to fit the variable part of the flux in this system, as opposed to modeling of the underlying galaxy. For the first time we observed smooth light variation over a period of a few months, which can be naturally attributed to microlensing. We also describe automated software capable of real time analysis of the images of QSO 2237+0305. It is expected that starting from the next observing season in 1999 an alert system will be implemented for high amplification events (HAE) in this object. Time sampling and photometric accuracy achieved should be sufficient for early detection of caustic crossings.
We present narrowband images of the gravitational lens system Q~2237+0305 made with the Nordic Optical Telescope in eight different filters covering the wavelength interval 3510-8130 AA. Using point-spread function photometry fitting we have derived the difference in magnitude versus wavelength between the four images of Q~2237+0305. At $lambda=4110$ AA, the wavelength range covered by the Stromgren-v filter coincides with the position and width of the CIV emission line. This allows us to determine the existence of microlensing in the continuum and not in the emission lines for two images of the quasar. Moreover, the brightness of image A shows a significant variation with wavelength which can only be explained as consequence of chromatic microlensing. To perform a complete analysis of this chromatic event our observations were used together with Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment light curves. Both data sets cannot be reproduced by the simple phenomenology described under the caustic crossing approximation; using more realistic representations of microlensing at high optical depth, we found solutions consistent with simple thin disk models ($r_{s}varpropto lambda^{4/3}$); however, other accretion disk size-wavelength relationships also lead to good solutions. New chromatic events from the ongoing narrow band photometric monitoring of Q~2237+0305 are needed to accurately constrain the physical properties of the accretion disk for this system.
We use the high magnification event seen in the 1999 OGLE campaign light curve of image C of the quadruply imaged gravitational lens Q2237+0305 to study the structure of the quasar engine. We have obtained g- and r-band photometry at the Apache Point Observatory 3.5m telescope where we find that the event has a smaller amplitude in the r-band than in the g- and OGLE V-bands. By comparing the light curves with microlensing simulations we obtain constraints on the sizes of the quasar regions contributing to the g- and r-band flux. Assuming that most of the surface mass density in the central kiloparsec of the lensing galaxy is due to stars and by modeling the source with a Gaussian profile, we obtain for the Gaussian width 1.20 x 10^15 sqrt(M/0.1M_sun)cm < sigma_g < 7.96 x 10^15 sqrt(M/0.1Msun) cm, where M is the mean microlensing mass, and a ratio sigma_r/sigma_g=1.25^{+0.45}_{-0.15}. With the limits on the velocity of the lensing galaxy from Gil-Merino et al. (2005) as our only prior, we obtain 0.60 x 10^15 sqrt(M/0.1Msun) cm < sigma_g < 1.57 x 10^15 sqrt(M/0.1Msun) cm and a ratio sigma_r/sigma_g=1.45^{+0.90}_{-0.25} (all values at 68 percent confidence). Additionally, from our microlensing simulations we find that, during the chromatic microlensing event observed, the continuum emitting region of the quasar crossed a caustic at >72 percent confidence.
We present the continuation of our long-term spectroscopic monitoring of the gravitationally lensed quasar QSO 2237+0305. We investigate the chromatic variations observed in the UV/optical continuum of both quasar images A and B, and compare them with numerical simulations to infer the energy profile of the quasar accretion disk. Our procedure combines the microlensing ray-shooting technique with Bayesian analysis, and derives probability distributions for the source sizes as a function of wavelength. We find that the effective caustic crossing timescale is 4.0+/-1.0 months. Using a robust prior on the effective transverse velocity, we find that the source responsible for the UV/optical continuum has an energy profile well reproduced by a power-law R lambda^{zeta} with zeta=1.2+/-0.3, where R is the source size responsible for the emission at wavelength lambda. This is the first accurate, model-independent determination of the energy profile of a quasar accretion disk on such small scales.
The discoveries of 17 microlensing event candidates have been reported over the last year by three teams conducting unprecedented mass photometric searches in the direction of the Galactic bulge and the Magellanic Clouds. These include 10 events found by the OGLE collaboration, 5 by the MACHO team and 2 by the EROS team. All searches have the main goal to detect dark matter in our Galaxy. The detection of 17 event candidates proves that the microlensing is a powerful tool in the search for dark matter, and it may be used for reliable mass determination when the geometry of the event is known. Here we present the first microlensing event, OGLE~#11, discovered in real time, using the newly implemented Early Warning System. We describe our system which makes it possible to monitor and study in great details any very rare phenomena, not only lensing events, with a broad array of instruments almost immediately after they have changed their brightness.
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