Gas Accretion in the M32 Nucleus: Past & Present

Abstract

Using adaptive optics assisted Gemini/NIFS data, I study the present and past gas accretion in the central 3" of the M32 nucleus. From changes in the spectral slope and CO line depths near the center, I find evidence for unresolved dust emission resulting from BH accretion. With a luminosity of ~2e38 erg/s, this dust emission appears to be the most luminous tracer of current BH accretion, two orders of magnitude more luminous than previously detected X-ray emission. These observations suggest that using high resolution infrared data to search for dust emission may be an effective way to detect other nearby, low luminosity BHs, such as those in globular clusters. I also examine the fossil evidence of gas accretion contained in the kinematics of the stars in the nucleus. The higher-order moments (h3 and h4) of the line-of-sight velocity distribution show patterns that are remarkably similar to those seen on larger scales in elliptical galaxies and in gas-rich merger simulations. The kinematics suggests the presence of two components in the M32 nucleus, a dominant disk overlying a pressure supported component. I discuss possible formation scenarios for the M32 nucleus in the context of the kinematic data as well as previous stellar population studies. The kinematic measurements presented here are the highest quality available for the nucleus of M32, and may be useful for any future dynamical models of this benchmark system.

8 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

References in corpus (13)

• The ACS Virgo Cluster Survey. VIII. The Nuclei of Early-Type Galaxies
• Radiatively Inefficient Accretion in Nearby Galaxies
• The Coincidence of Nuclear Star Clusters and Active Galactic Nuclei
• The SAURON project - XII. Kinematic substructures in early-type galaxies: evidence for disks in fast rotators
• The central parsecs of Centaurus A: High Excitation Gas, a Molecular Disk, and the Mass of the Black Hole
• VLT Kinematics for omega Centauri: Further Support for a Central Black Hole
• The Black Hole in NGC 3379: A Comparison of Gas and Stellar Dynamical Mass Measurements with HST and Integral-Field Data
• Red giant stellar collisions in the Galactic Centre
• Radio Emission from the Intermediate-mass Black Hole in the Globular Cluster G1
• The supermassive black hole of Fornax A
• Habitability of exoplanetary systems with planets observed in transit
• First Detection of Near-Infrared Intraday Variations in the Seyfert 1 Nucleus NGC4395
• Probing the Central Regions of Nearby Compact Elliptical Galaxies

Cited by in corpus (18)

• A Supermassive Black Hole in an Ultracompact Dwarf Galaxy
• The ACS Fornax Cluster Survey. VI. The Nuclei of Early-Type Galaxies in the Fornax Cluster
• Nearby Early-Type Galactic Nuclei at High Resolution: Dynamical Black Hole and Nuclear Star Cluster Mass Measurements
• Illuminating Massive Black Holes With White Dwarfs: Orbital Dynamics and High Energy Transients from Tidal Interactions
• Spoon-Feeding Giant Stars to Supermassive Black Holes: Episodic Mass Transfer from Evolving Stars and Their Contribution to the Quiescent Activity of Galactic Nuclei
• The Black Hole in the Most Massive Ultracompact Dwarf Galaxy M59-UCD3
• The Panchromatic Hubble Andromeda Treasury I: Bright UV Stars in the Bulge of M31
• The HST/ACS Coma Cluster Survey: VII - Colour Gradients in Giant and Dwarf Early-Type Galaxies
• On the origins of enigmatic stellar populations in Local Group galactic nuclei
• Upper limits on the presence of central massive black holes in two ultra-compact dwarf galaxies in Centaurus A
• Circumnuclear Molecular Gas in Megamaser Disk Galaxies NGC 4388 and NGC 1194
• Secular Dynamical Anti-Friction in Galactic Nuclei
• Forming circumnuclear disks and rings in galactic nuclei: a competition between supermassive black hole and nuclear star cluster
• Surprisingly Strong K-band Emission Found in Low Luminosity Active Galactic Nuclei
• X-ray and radio observations of central black holes in nearby low-mass early-type galaxies: Preliminary evidence for low Eddington fractions
• A population of luminous globular clusters and stripped nuclei with elevated mass to light ratios around NGC 5128
• Resolved nuclear kinematics link the formation and growth of nuclear star clusters with the evolution of their early and late-type hosts
• Massive black hole formation in dense stellar environments: Enhanced X-ray detection rates in high velocity dispersion nuclear star clusters