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Register a new userBroad Band Photometric Reverberation Mapping of NGC 4395
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We present results of broad band photometric reverberation mapping (RM) to measure the radius of the broad line region, and subsequently the black hole mass (M$_{rm BH}$), in the nearby, low luminosity active galactic nuclei (AGN) NGC 4395. Using the Wise Observatorys 1m telescope equipped with the SDSS g$$, r$$ and i$$ broad band filters, we monitored NGC 4395 for 9 consecutive nights and obtained 3 light curves each with over 250 data points. The g$$ and r$$ bands include time variable contributions from H$beta$ and H$alpha$ (respectively) plus continuum. The i$$ band is free of broad lines and covers exclusively continuum. We show that by looking for a peak in the difference between the cross-correlation and the auto-correlation functions for all combinations of filters, we can get a reliable estimate of the time lag necessary to compute M$_{rm BH}$. We measure the time lag for H$alpha$ to be $3.6 pm 0.8 $ hours, comparable to previous studies using the line resolved spectroscopic RM method. We argue that this lag implies a black hole mass of M$_{rm BH} = (4.9 pm 2.6) times 10^{4}$ Msun .
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A method is proposed for measuring the size of the broad emission line region (BLR) in quasars using broadband photometric data. A feasibility study, based on numerical simulations, points to the advantages and pitfalls associated with this approach. The method is applied to a subset of the Palomar-Green quasar sample for which independent BLR size measurements are available. An agreement is found between the results of the photometric method and the spectroscopic reverberation mapping technique. Implications for the measurement of BLR sizes and black hole masses for numerous quasars in the era of large surveys are discussed.
We present the results of a high-cadence spectroscopic and imaging monitoring campaign of the active galactic nucleus (AGN) of NGC 4395. High signal-to-noise-ratio spectra were obtained at the Gemini-N 8 m telescope using the GMOS integral field spectrograph (IFS) on 2019 March 7, and at the Keck-I 10 m telescope using the Low-Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (LRIS) with slitmasks on 2019 March 3 and April 2. Photometric data were obtained with a number of 1 m-class telescopes during the same nights. The narrow-line region (NLR) is spatially resolved; therefore, its variable contributions to the slit spectra make the standard procedure of relative flux calibration impractical. We demonstrate that spatially-resolved data from the IFS can be effectively used to correct the slit-mask spectral light curves. While we obtained no reliable lag owing to the lack of strong variability pattern in the light curves, we constrain the broad line time lag to be less than 3 hr, consistent with the photometric lag of $sim80$ min reported by Woo et al. (2019). By exploiting the high-quality spectra, we measure the second moment of the broad component of the H$alpha$ emission line to be $586pm19$ km s$^{-1}$, superseding the lower value reported by Woo et al. (2019). Combining the revised line dispersion and the photometric time lag, we update the black hole mass as $(1.7pm 0.3)times10^4$ M$_{odot}$.
A detailed analysis of the data from a high sampling rate, multi-month reverberation mapping campaign, undertaken primarily at MDM Observatory with supporting observations from telescopes around the world, reveals that the Hbeta emission region within the broad line regions (BLRs) of several nearby AGNs exhibit a variety of kinematic behaviors. While the primary goal of this campaign was to obtain either new or improved Hbeta reverberation lag measurements for several relatively low luminosity AGNs (presented in a separate work), we were also able to unambiguously reconstruct velocity-resolved reverberation signals from a subset of our targets. Through high cadence spectroscopic monitoring of the optical continuum and broad Hbeta emission line variations observed in the nuclear regions of NGC 3227, NGC 3516, and NGC 5548, we clearly see evidence for outflowing, infalling, and virialized BLR gas motions, respectively.
By using standard broad-band VRI photometry we were able to discriminate the variations of the broad hydrogen alpha line from the continuum variations for the active galaxy Mkn 279. Cross-correlating both light curves enabled us to determine the time lag of the broad line variations behind the continuum and thus to determine the BLR size (about 8 light days). Our preliminary results are rather consistent with the spectroscopic reverberation mapping results (about 12/17 days). This study is a part of an ambitious program to perform photometric reverberation mapping and determine BLR sizes (respectively - the central black hole masses) for more that 100 nearby AGN.
We present ground-based optical photometric monitoring data for NGC 5548, part of an extended multi-wavelength reverberation mapping campaign. The light curves have nearly daily cadence from 2014 January to July in nine filters (emph{BVRI} and emph{ugriz}). Combined with ultraviolet data from the emph{Hubble Space Telescope} and emph{Swift}, we confirm significant time delays between the continuum bands as a function of wavelength, extending the wavelength coverage from 1158,AA to the $z$ band ($sim!9160$,AA). We find that the lags at wavelengths longer than the {it V} band are equal to or greater than the lags of high-ionization-state emission lines (such as He,{sc ii},$lambda 1640$ and $lambda 4686$), suggesting that the continuum-emitting source is of a physical size comparable to the inner broad-line region (BLR). The trend of lag with wavelength is broadly consistent with the prediction for continuum reprocessing by an accretion disk with $tau propto lambda^{4/3}$. However, the lags also imply a disk radius that is 3 times larger than the prediction from standard thin-disk theory, assuming that the bolometric luminosity is 10% of the Eddington luminosity ($L = 0.1L_{rm Edd}$). Using optical spectra from the Large Binocular Telescope, we estimate the bias of the interband continuum lags due to BLR emission observed in the filters. We find that the bias for filters with high levels of BLR contamination ($sim! 20%$) can be important for the shortest continuum lags, and likely has a significant impact on the {it u} and {it U} bands owing to Balmer continuum emission.
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