Bibcode
Hernán-Caballero, A.; Alonso-Herrero, A.; Hatziminaoglou, E.; Spoon, Henrik W. W.; Ramos Almeida, C.; Díaz Santos, T.; Hönig, S. F.; González-Martín, O.; Esquej, P.
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 803, Issue 2, article id. 109, 16 pp. (2015).
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4
2015
Journal
Citations
60
Refereed citations
56
Description
We present results on the spectral decomposition of 118 Spitzer Infrared
Spectrograph (IRS) spectra from local active galactic nuclei (AGNs)
using a large set of Spitzer/IRS spectra as templates. The templates are
themselves IRS spectra from extreme cases where a single physical
component (stellar, interstellar, or AGN) completely dominates the
integrated mid-infrared emission. We show that a linear combination of
one template for each physical component reproduces the observed IRS
spectra of AGN hosts with unprecedented fidelity for a template fitting
method with no need to model extinction separately. We use full
probability distribution functions to estimate expectation values and
uncertainties for observables, and find that the decomposition results
are robust against degeneracies. Furthermore, we compare the AGN spectra
derived from the spectral decomposition with sub-arcsecond resolution
nuclear photometry and spectroscopy from ground-based observations. We
find that the AGN component derived from the decomposition closely
matches the nuclear spectrum with a 1σ dispersion of 0.12 dex in
luminosity and typical uncertainties of ∼0.19 in the spectral index
and ∼0.1 in the silicate strength. We conclude that the emission
from the host galaxy can be reliably removed from the IRS spectra of
AGNs. This allows for unbiased studies of the AGN emission in
intermediate- and high-redshift galaxies—currently inaccesible to
ground-based observations—with archival Spitzer/IRS data and in
the future with the Mid-InfraRed Instrument of the James Webb Space
Telescope. The decomposition code and templates are available at http://denebola.org/ahc/deblendIRS.
Related projects
Nuclear Activity in Galaxies: a 3D Perspective from the Nucleus to the Outskirts
This project consists of two main research lines. First, the study of quasar-driven outflows in luminous and nearby obscured active galactic nuclei (AGN) and the impact that they have on their massive host galaxies (AGN feedback). To do so, we have obtained Gran Telescopio CANARIAS (GTC) infrared and optical observations with the instruments
Cristina
Ramos Almeida