Space Telescope and Optical Reverberation Mapping Project. XII. Broad-line Region Modeling of NGC 5548

Williams, P. R.; Pancoast, A.; Treu, T.; Brewer, B. J.; Peterson, B. M.; Barth, A. J.; Malkan, M. A.; De Rosa, G.; Horne, Keith; Kriss, G. A.; Arav, N.; Bentz, M. C.; Cackett, E. M.; Dalla Bontà, E.; Dehghanian, M.; Done, C.; Ferland, G. J.; Grier, C. J.; Kaastra, J.; Kara, E.; Kochanek, C. S.; Mathur, S.; Mehdipour, M.; Pogge, R. W.; Proga, D.; Vestergaard, M.; Waters, T.; Adams, S. M.; Anderson, M. D.; Arévalo, P.; Beatty, T. G.; Bennert, V. N.; Bigley, A.; Bisogni, S.; Borman, G. A.; Boroson, T. A.; Bottorff, M. C.; Brandt, W. N.; Breeveld, A. A.; Brotherton, M.; Brown, J. E.; Brown, J. S.; Canalizo, G.; Carini, M. T.; Clubb, K. I.; Comerford, J. M.; Corsini, E. M.; Crenshaw, D. M.; Croft, S.; Croxall, K. V.; Deason, A. J.; De Lorenzo-Cáceres, A.; Denney, K. D.; Dietrich, M.; Edelson, R.; Efimova, N. V.; Ely, J.; Evans, P. A.; Fausnaugh, M. M.; Filippenko, A. V.; Flatland, K.; Fox, O. D.; Gardner, E.; Gates, E. L.; Gehrels, N.; Geier, S.; Gelbord, J. M.; Gonzalez, L.; Gorjian, V.; Greene, J. E.; Grupe, D.; Gupta, A.; Hall, P. B.; Henderson, C. B.; Hicks, S.; Holmbeck, E.; Holoien, T. W. -S.; Hutchison, T.; Im, M.; Jensen, J. J.; Johnson, C. A.; Joner, M. D.; Jones, J.; Kaspi, S.; Kelly, P. L.; Kennea, J. A.; Kim, M.; Kim, S.; Kim, S. C.; King, A.; Klimanov, S. A.; Knigge, C.; Krongold, Y.; Lau, M. W.; Lee, J. C.; Leonard, D. C.; Li, Miao; Lira, P.; Lochhaas, C.; Ma, Zhiyuan et al.
Bibliographical reference

The Astrophysical Journal

Advertised on:
10
2020
Number of authors
158
IAC number of authors
2
Citations
24
Refereed citations
22
Description
We present geometric and dynamical modeling of the broad line region (BLR) for the multi-wavelength reverberation mapping campaign focused on NGC 5548 in 2014. The data set includes photometric and spectroscopic monitoring in the optical and ultraviolet, covering the Hβ, C IV, and Lyα broad emission lines. We find an extended disk-like Hβ BLR with a mixture of near-circular and outflowing gas trajectories, while the C IV and Lyα BLRs are much less extended and resemble shell-like structures. There is clear radial structure in the BLR, with C IV the three lines, we make three independent black hole mass measurements, all of which are consistent. Combining these results gives a joint inference of ${\mathrm{log}}_{10}({M}_{\mathrm{BH}}/{M}_{\odot })={7.64}_{-0.18}^{+0.21}$ . We examine the effect of using the V band instead of the UV continuum light curve on the results and find a size difference that is consistent with the measured UV-optical time lag, but the other structural and kinematic parameters remain unchanged, suggesting that the V band is a suitable proxy for the ionizing continuum when exploring the BLR structure and kinematics. Finally, we compare the Hβ results to similar models of data obtained in 2008 when the active galactic nucleus was at a lower luminosity state. We find that the size of the emitting region increased during this time period, but the geometry and black hole mass remained unchanged, which confirms that the BLR kinematics suitably gauge the gravitational field of the central black hole.
Related projects
Project Image
Formation and Evolution of Galaxies: Observations in Infrared and other Wavelengths

This IAC research group carries out several extragalactic projects in different spectral ranges, using space as well as ground-based telescopes, to study the cosmological evolution of galaxies and the origin of nuclear activity in active galaxies. The group is a member of the international consortium which built the SPIRE instrument for the

Ismael
Pérez Fournon