Constraints on black hole fuelling modes from the clustering of X-ray AGN

Abstract

We present a clustering analysis of X-ray selected AGN by compiling X-ray samples from the literature and re-estimating the dark matter (DM) halo masses of AGN in a uniform manner. We find that moderate luminosity AGN (Lx(2-10 keV)=10^42-10^44 erg/sec) in the z=0-1.3 Universe are typically found in DM haloes with masses of ~10^13 Msun. We then compare our findings to the theoretical predictions of the coupled galaxy and black hole formation model GALFORM. We find good agreement when our calculation includes the hot-halo mode of accretion onto the central black hole. This type of accretion, which is additional to the common cold accretion during disk instabilities and galaxy mergers, is tightly coupled to the AGN feedback in the model. The hot-halo mode becomes prominent in DM haloes with masses greater than ~10^12.5 Msun, where AGN feedback typically operates, giving rise to a distinct class of moderate luminosity AGN that inhabit rich clusters and superclusters. Cold gas fuelling of the black hole cannot produce the observationally inferred DM halo masses of X-ray AGN. Switching off AGN feedback in the model results in a large population of luminous quasars (Lx(2-10 keV) > 10^44 erg/sec) in DM haloes with masses up to ~10^14 Msun, which is inconsistent with the observed clustering of quasars. The abundance of hot-halo AGN decreases significantly in the z~3-4 universe. At such high redshifts, the cold accretion mode is solely responsible for shaping the environment of moderate luminosity AGN. Our analysis supports two accretion modes (cold and hot) for the fuelling of supermassive black holes and strongly underlines the importance of AGN feedback in cosmological models both of galaxy formation and black hole growth.

10 pages, 4 figures, submitted to MNRAS (comments are welcome)

References in corpus (50)

• The Sloan Digital Sky Survey: Technical Summary
• Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Cosmological Interpretation
• Simulating the joint evolution of quasars, galaxies and their large-scale distribution
• The broken hierarchy of galaxy formation
• Advection-Dominated Accretion: A Self-Similar Solution
• Hierarchical Galaxy Formation
• Ellipsoidal collapse and an improved model for the number and spatial distribution of dark matter haloes
• A Cosmological Framework for the Co-Evolution of Quasars, Supermassive Black Holes, and Elliptical Galaxies: I. Galaxy Mergers & Quasar Activity
• Local Supermassive Black Holes, Relics of Active Galactic Nuclei and the X-ray Background
• A unified model for AGN feedback in cosmological simulations of structure formation
• Cosmological simulations of the growth of supermassive black holes and feedback from active galactic nuclei: method and tests
• What Drives the Growth of Black Holes?
• Direct cosmological simulations of the growth of black holes and galaxies
• Feast and Famine: Regulation of Black Hole Growth in Low Redshift Galaxies
• Grand unification of AGN activity in the LambdaCDM cosmology
• Clustering of Low-Redshift (z <= 2.2) Quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• The Angular Momentum of Gas in Proto-Galaxies I. Implications for the Formation of Disk Galaxies
• Cosmic evolution of the atomic and molecular gas content of galaxies
• The 2dF-SDSS LRG and QSO Survey: QSO clustering and the L-z degeneracy
• Enhanced star formation rates in AGN hosts with respect to inactive galaxies from PEP-Herschel observations
• The Effects of Gas on Morphological Transformation in Mergers: Implications for Bulge and Disk Demographics
• The evolution of AGN across cosmic time: what is downsizing?
• Predictions for the CO emission of galaxies from a coupled simulation of galaxy formation and photon dominated regions
• AEGIS: The Clustering of X-ray AGN Relative to Galaxies at z~1
• Black Hole Growth in Hierarchical Galaxy Formation
• The XMM-Newton Wide field survey in the COSMOS field: redshift evolution of AGN bias and subdominant role of mergers in triggering moderate luminosity AGN at redshift up to 2.2
• Is AGN feedback necessary to form red elliptical galaxies?
• Modeling the cosmological co-evolution of supermassive black holes and galaxies: I. BH scaling relations and the AGN luminosity function
• Quasar host galaxy star formation activity from multicolour data
• The spatial clustering of X-ray selected AGN in the XMM-COSMOS field
• Modelling the evolution of galaxy clustering
• Modeling the cosmological co-evolution of supermassive black holes and galaxies: II. The clustering of quasars and their dark environment
• The Spatial Clustering of ROSAT All-Sky Survey AGNs III. Expanded Sample and Comparison with Optical AGNs
• The Spatial Clustering of ROSAT All-Sky Survey AGNs II. Halo Occupation Distribution Modeling of the Cross Correlation Function
• The evolution of Lyman-break galaxies in CDM
• The Spatial Clustering of ROSAT All-Sky Survey AGN: I. The cross-correlation function with SDSS Luminous Red Galaxies
• Clustering, Bias and the Accretion Mode of X-ray selected AGN
• AGN clustering in the local Universe: an unbiased picture from Swift-BAT
• Constraining halo occupation properties of X-ray AGNs using clustering of Chandra sources in the Bootes survey region
• The clustering of Ly-alpha emitters in a LambdaCDM Universe
• Spatial Correlation Function of the Chandra Selected Active Galactic Nuclei
• The UV colours and dust attenuation of Lyman-break galaxies
• Measuring the Dark Matter Halo Mass of X-ray AGN at z~1 using photometric redshifts
• The XMM-{\em Newton}/2dF Survey - VI: Clustering and Bias of the Soft X-ray Point Sources
• The clustering of X-ray selected AGN at z=0.1
• The spatial distribution of cold gas in hierarchical galaxy formation models
• Spatial decomposition of on-nucleus spectra of quasar host galaxies
• The dependence of AGN activity on stellar and halo mass in Semi-Analytic Models
• Observational constraints on the physics behind the evolution of AGN since z ~ 1
• The spatial distribution of X-ray selected AGN in the Chandra deep fields: a theoretical perspective

Cited by in corpus (44)

• A unified multi-wavelength model of galaxy formation
• Black hole variability and the star formation-AGN connection: Do all star-forming galaxies host an AGN?
• A refined sub-grid model for black hole accretion and AGN feedback in large cosmological simulations
• The (black hole)-bulge mass scaling relation at low masses
• Detailed Shape and Evolutionary Behavior of the X-ray Luminosity Function of Active Galactic Nuclei
• Observational constraints on the specific accretion-rate distribution of X-ray selected AGN
• Active Galactic Nuclei and their Large-scale Structure: an eROSITA mock catalogue
• PRIMUS + DEEP2: Clustering of X-ray, Radio and IR-AGN at z~0.7
• Clustering properties of moderate luminosity X-ray selected Type 1 and Type 2 AGN at z~3
• The Dark Matter Halos of Moderate Luminosity X-ray AGN as Determined from Weak Gravitational Lensing and Host Stellar Masses
• The spatial clustering of ROSAT All-Sky Survey Active Galactic Nuclei IV. More massive black holes reside in more massive dark matter halos
• Semi-analytic forecasts for JWST -- V. AGN luminosity functions and helium reionization at z = 2-7
• Black Hole Demography: From scaling relations to models
• The XXL Survey: VI. The 1000 brightest X-ray point sources
• Exploring the halo occupation of AGN using dark-matter cosmological simulations
• Probing the Radio Loud/Quiet AGN dichotomy with quasar clustering
• The role of AGN and its obscuration on the position of the host galaxy relative to Main Sequence
• Investigating evidence for different black hole accretion modes since redshift z~1
• Effects of Inclination on Measuring Velocity Dispersion and Implications for Black Holes
• Star formation of X-ray AGN in COSMOS: The role of AGN activity and galaxy stellar mass
• The New Numerical Galaxy Catalogue (ν^2 GC): Properties of Active Galactic Nuclei and Their Host Galaxies
• The 2QDES Pilot : The luminosity and redshift dependence of quasar clustering
• The clustering amplitude of X-ray selected AGN at z=0.8: Evidence for a negative dependence on accretion luminosity
• The dependence of the X-ray AGN clustering on the properties of the host galaxy
• The Chandra COSMOS Legacy Survey: Clustering of X-ray selected AGN at 2.9<z<5.5 using photometric redshift Probability Distribution Functions
• AGN and QSOs in the eROSITA All-Sky Survey -- Part II: The large-scale structure
• Semi-analytic modelling of AGNs: auto-correlation function and halo occupation
• Clustering of gamma-ray selected 2LAC Fermi Blazars
• Can AGN and galaxy clusters explain the surface brightness fluctuations of the cosmic X-ray background?
• The environment of radio galaxies: A signature of AGN feedback at high redshifts
• Extremely Massive Quasars are not Good Proxies for Dense Environments Compared to Massive Galaxies: Environments of Extremely Massive Quasars and Galaxies
• The XMM-Newton Wide Field Survey in the COSMOS Field: Clustering Dependence of X-ray Selected AGN on Host Galaxy Properties
• Probing star formation rates and histories in AGN and non-AGN galaxies across diverse cosmic environments and extensive X-ray luminosity ranges
• Linking X-ray AGN with dark matter halos: a model compatible with AGN luminosity function and large-scale clustering properties
• Properties of Galaxies around AGNs with Most Massive Supermassive Black Hole Revealed by the Clustering Analysis
• Revisiting the clustering of narrow-line AGN in the local Universe: Joint dependence on stellar mass and color
• The Star Formation and AGN luminosity relation: Predictions from a semi-analytical model
• The XXL Survey XXXII. Spatial clustering of the XXL-S AGN
• Clustering, Cosmology and a New Era of Black Hole Demographics -- I. The Conditional Luminosity Function of Active Galactic Nuclei
• Evolution of black hole and galaxy growth in a semi-numerical galaxy formation model
• Black hole-galaxy co-evolution and the role of feedback
• Large-scale environments of star-forming active galactic nuclei: How black hole mass, accretion rate, and luminosity connect to dark matter halos
• Comparison of the spatial and the angular clustering of X-ray AGN
• Thermomagnetic Ettingshausen-Nernst effect in tachocline, magnetic reconnection phenomenon in lower layers, axion mechanism of solar luminosity variations, coronal heating problem solution and mechanism of ADM variations around BH