The MOSDEF survey: AGN multi-wavelength identification, selection biases and host galaxy properties

Abstract

We present results from the MOSFIRE Deep Evolution Field (MOSDEF) survey on the identification, selection biases, and host galaxy properties of 55 X-ray, IR and optically-selected active galactic nuclei (AGN) at $1.4<z<3.8$. We obtain rest-frame optical spectra of galaxies and AGN and use the BPT diagram to identify optical AGN. We examine the uniqueness and overlap of the AGN identified at different wavelengths. There is a strong bias against identifying AGN at any wavelength in low mass galaxies, and an additional bias against identifying IR AGN in the most massive galaxies. AGN hosts span a wide range of star formation rate (SFR), similar to inactive galaxies once stellar mass selection effects are accounted for. However, we find (at $\sim 2-3\sigma$ significance) that IR AGN are in less dusty galaxies with relatively higher SFR and optical AGN in dusty galaxies with relatively lower SFR. X-ray AGN selection does not display a bias with host galaxy SFR. These results are consistent with those from larger studies at lower redshifts. Within star-forming galaxies, once selection biases are accounted for, we find AGN in galaxies with similar physical properties as inactive galaxies, with no evidence for AGN activity in particular types of galaxies. This is consistent with AGN being fueled stochastically in any star-forming host galaxy. We do not detect a significant correlation between SFR and AGN luminosity for individual AGN hosts, which may indicate the timescale difference between the growth of galaxies and their supermassive black holes.

References in corpus (131)

• Galactic Stellar and Substellar Initial Mass Function
• The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE): Mission Description and Initial On-orbit Performance
• Star Formation in Galaxies Along the Hubble Sequence
• The Dust Content and Opacity of Actively Star-Forming Galaxies
• A Fundamental Relation Between Supermassive Black Holes and Their Host Galaxies
• The Demography of Massive Dark Objects in Galaxy Centres
• The Host Galaxies of AGN
• A Relationship Between Nuclear Black Hole Mass and Galaxy Velocity Dispersion
• The Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) for the Spitzer Space Telescope
• The physical properties of star forming galaxies in the low redshift universe
• Theoretical Modeling of Starburst Galaxies
• The Optical and Near-Infrared Properties of Galaxies: I. Luminosity and Stellar Mass Functions
• CANDELS: The Cosmic Assembly Near-infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey
• CANDELS: The Cosmic Assembly Near-infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey - The Hubble Space Telescope Observations, Imaging Data Products and Mosaics
• Star Formation in AEGIS Field Galaxies since z=1.1 : The Dominance of Gradually Declining Star Formation, and the Main Sequence of Star-Forming Galaxies
• The propagation of uncertainties in stellar population synthesis modeling I: The relevance of uncertain aspects of stellar evolution and the IMF to the derived physical properties of galaxies
• EAZY: A Fast, Public Photometric Redshift Code
• The reversal of the star formation-density relation in the distant universe
• Quantifying the bimodal color-magnitude distribution of galaxies
• The Co-Evolution of Galaxies and Supermassive Black Holes: Insights from Surveys of the Contemporary Universe
• Spectral Energy Distributions and Multiwavelength Selection of Type 1 Quasars
• An Observational Determination of the Bolometric Quasar Luminosity Function
• The Galaxy Luminosity Function and Luminosity Density at Redshift z=0.1
• An ultra-deep near-infrared spectrum of a compact quiescent galaxy at z=2.2
• 3D-HST WFC3-selected Photometric Catalogs in the Five CANDELS/3D-HST Fields: Photometry, Photometric Redshifts and Stellar Masses
• The Evolution of the Stellar Mass Functions of Star-Forming and Quiescent Galaxies to z = 4 from the COSMOS/UltraVISTA Survey
• Detection of quiescent galaxies in a bicolor sequence from z=0-2
• Mid-Infrared Selection of Active Galaxies
• The synthesis of the cosmic X-ray background in the Chandra and XMM-Newton era
• The Star-formation Mass Sequence out to z=2.5
• Present-Day Growth of Black Holes and Bulges: the SDSS Perspective
• 3D-HST: A wide-field grism spectroscopic survey with the Hubble Space Telescope
• Obscured and unobscured active galactic nuclei in the Spitzer Space Telescope First Look Survey
• Identifying Luminous AGN in Deep Surveys: Revised IRAC Selection Criteria
• The star formation history of mass-selected galaxies in the COSMOS field
• Strong Nebular Line Ratios in the Spectra of z~2-3 Star-forming Galaxies: First Results from KBSS-MOSFIRE
• What Drives the Growth of Black Holes?
• Optical and Radio Properties of Extragalactic Sources Observed by the FIRST and SDSS Surveys
• Host galaxies, clustering, Eddington ratios, and evolution of radio, X-ray, and infrared-selected AGNs
• The NEWFIRM Medium-band Survey: Photometric Catalogs, Redshifts and the Bimodal Color Distribution of Galaxies out to z~3
• Piecing Together the X-ray Background: Bolometric Corrections for Active Galactic Nuclei
• Theoretical Evolution of Optical Strong Lines across Cosmic Time
• The MOSFIRE Deep Evolution Field (MOSDEF) Survey: Rest-Frame Optical Spectroscopy for ~1500 H-Selected Galaxies at 1.37 < z < 3.8
• Bolometric luminosities and Eddington ratios of X-ray selected Active Galactic Nuclei in the XMM-COSMOS survey
• Major Galaxy Mergers Only Trigger the Most Luminous AGN
• Black hole variability and the star formation-AGN connection: Do all star-forming galaxies host an AGN?
• The evolution of the hard X-ray luminosity function of AGN
• Using the Bright Ultra-Hard XMM-Newton Survey to define an IR selection of luminous AGN based on WISE colours
• Multiwavelength study of massive galaxies at z~2. II. Widespread Compton thick AGN and the concurrent growth of black holes and bulges
• Cosmic X-ray Surveys of Distant Active Galaxies: The Demographics, Physics, and Ecology of Growing Supermassive Black Holes
• The MOSDEF Survey: Electron Density and Ionization Parameter at $z\sim 2.3$
• Low Resolution Spectral Templates For AGNs and Galaxies From 0.03 -- 30 microns
• Feast and Famine: Regulation of Black Hole Growth in Low Redshift Galaxies
• PRIMUS: The dependence of AGN accretion on host stellar mass and color
• Obscuration-dependent evolution of Active Galactic Nuclei
• The Mean Star Formation Rate of X-ray selected Active Galaxies and its Evolution from z=2.5: Results from PEP-Herschel
• The Luminosity Function of X-ray Selected Active Galactic Nuclei: Evolution of Supermassive Black Holes at High Redshift
• Emission-line Diagnostics of Low Metallicity AGN
• The Relationship of Hard X-ray and Optical Line Emission in Low Redshift Active Galactic Nuclei
• The evolving relations between size, mass, surface density, and star formation in 3x10^4 galaxies since z=2
• AEGIS: The color-magnitude relation for X-ray selected AGN
• Supermassive black holes do not correlate with galaxy disks or pseudobulges
• GOODS-Herschel: The far-infrared view of star formation in AGN host galaxies since z~3
• Accreting SMBHs in the COSMOS field and the connection to their host galaxies
• Infrared power-law galaxies in the Chandra Deep Field South: AGN and ULIRGs
• The MOSDEF Survey: Excitation Properties of $z\sim 2.3$ Star-forming Galaxies
• Unveiling obscured accretion in the Chandra Deep Field South
• Timing the starburst-AGN connection
• Metallicity and Nuclear Star Formation in Nearby Galaxy Pairs: Evidence for Tidally Induced Gas Flows
• A New Diagnostic of Active Galactic Nuclei: Revealing Highly-Absorbed Systems at Redshift>0.3
• Accretion and star formation rates in low redshift type-II active galactic nuclei
• Towards a Complete Census of AGNs in Nearby Galaxies: A Large Population of Optically Unidentified AGNs
• Enhanced star formation rates in AGN hosts with respect to inactive galaxies from PEP-Herschel observations
• Evidence for Wide-Spread AGN Driven Outflows in the Most Massive z~1-2 Star Forming Galaxies
• AEGIS-X: The Chandra Deep Survey of the Extended Groth Strip
• Physical Properties of Emission-Line Galaxies at z ~ 2 from Near-Infrared Spectroscopy with Magellan FIRE
• Spitzer's Contribution to the AGN Population
• Spitzer Power-law AGN Candidates in the Chandra Deep Field-North
• A correlation between star formation rate and average black hole accretion in star forming galaxies
• The LABOCA Survey of the Extended Chandra Deep Field South: Clustering of submillimetre galaxies
• Color-Magnitude Relations of Active and Non-Active Galaxies in the Chandra Deep Fields: High-Redshift Constraints and Stellar-Mass Selection Effects
• AGN Emission Line Diagnostics and the Mass-Metallicity Relation up to Redshift z~2: the Impact of Selection Effects and Evolution
• HST WFC3/IR Observations of Active Galactic Nucleus Host Galaxies at z~2: Supermassive Black Holes Grow in Disk Galaxies
• A remarkably flat relationship between the average star formation rate and AGN luminosity for distant X-ray AGN
• The XMM-Newton wide-field survey in the COSMOS field: III. optical identification and multiwavelength properties of a large sample of X-ray selected sources
• The Relationship Between Black Hole Growth and Star Formation in Seyfert Galaxies
• No clear submillimetre signature of suppressed star formation amongst X-ray luminous AGNs
• The KMOS AGN Survey at High redshift (KASHz): the prevalence and drivers of ionised outflows in the host galaxies of X-ray AGN
• The MOSDEF Survey: Optical AGN Diagnostics at z~2.3
• AEGIS-X: Deep Chandra imaging of the Central Groth Strip
• The Biases of Optical Line-Ratio Selection for Active Galactic Nuclei, and the Intrinsic Relationship between Black Hole Accretion and Galaxy Star Formation
• The MOSDEF Survey: Dissecting the star-formation rate vs. stellar mass relation using H$\alpha$ and H$\beta$ emission lines at z ~ 2
• The XMM Deep survey in the CDFS I. First results on heavily obscured AGN
• A deep VLA survey at 6 cm in the Lockman Hole
• Heavily Obscured Quasar Host Galaxies at z~2 are Disks, Not Major Mergers
• ALMA and Herschel reveal that X-ray selected AGN and main-sequence galaxies have different star formation rate distributions
• The search for active black holes in nearby low-mass galaxies using optical and mid-IR data
• Nuclear Activity is more prevalent in Star-Forming Galaxies
• The Environments of Active Galactic Nuclei within the zCOSMOS Density Field
• NIR Spectroscopy of Star-Forming Galaxies at z~1.4 with Subaru/FMOS: The Mass-Metallicity Relation
• Compton thick active galactic nuclei in Chandra surveys
• The History and Environment of a Faded Quasar: Hubble Space Telescope observations of Hanny's Voorwerp and IC 2497
• Indicators of Intrinsic AGN Luminosity: a Multi-Wavelength Approach
• Compton Thick AGN in the XMM-COSMOS survey
• PRIMUS: Infrared and X-ray AGN Selection Techniques at 0.2<z<1.2
• The star formation rates of active galactic nuclei host galaxies
• The Mid-IR and X-ray Selected QSO Luminosity Function
• Dust-Corrected Colors Reveal Bimodality in AGN Host Galaxy Colors at z~1
• XMM-Newton observations of Seyfert galaxies from the Palomar spectroscopic survey: the X-ray absorption distribution
• Nebular Excitation in z~2 Star-forming Galaxies from the SINS and LUCI Surveys: The Influence of Shocks and AGN
• The host galaxies of X-ray selected Active Galactic Nuclei to z=2.5: Structure, star-formation and their relationships from CANDELS and Herschel/PACS
• X-ray Spectral Constraints for z~2 Massive Galaxies: The Identification of Reflection-Dominated Active Galactic Nuclei
• ZFOURGE catalogue of AGN candidates: an enhancement of 160μm-derived star-formation rates in active galaxies to $z$ = 3.2
• The Host Galaxies and Black Holes of Typical z~0.5-1.4 AGN
• Testing Diagnostics of Nuclear Activity and Star Formation in Galaxies at z>1
• A new infrared color criterion for the selection of 0<z<7 AGN: application to deep fields and implications for JWST surveys
• Searching for mid-IR obscured AGN in the CDF-N
• Tracing the evolution of Active Galactic Nuclei host galaxies over the last 9 Gyrs of Cosmic time
• Predicting the redshift 2 Halpha luminosity function using [OIII] emission line galaxies
• Hot-Dust-Poor Quasars in Mid-Infrared and Optically Selected Samples
• On the Star Formation-AGN Connection at $z\lesssim 0.3$
• An enhanced fraction of starbursting galaxies among high Eddington ratio AGNs
• Stellar Populations of UV-Selected Active Galactic Nuclei Host Galaxies at z ~ 2 - 3
• The OPTX Project IV: How Reliable is [OIII] as a Measure of AGN Activity?
• Investigating evidence for different black hole accretion modes since redshift z~1
• On the Timescale for Star Formation in Galaxies
• Theoretical Modeling of Emission-Line galaxies: New Classification Parameters for Mid-Infrared and Optical Spectroscopy
• Higher prevalence of X-ray selected AGN in intermediate age galaxies up to z~1
• A Multi-wavelength Survey of AGN in Massive Clusters: AGN Detection and Cluster AGN Fraction
• Discovery of Compton-thick quasars in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• A Novel Method to Identify AGNs Based on Emission Line Excess and the Nature of Low-luminosity AGNs in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: I - A Novel Method

Cited by in corpus (79)

• The MOSDEF Survey: The Evolution of the Mass-Metallicity Relation from $z=0$ to $z\sim 3.3$
• The KMOS^3D Survey: Demographics and Properties of Galactic Outflows at z = 0.6 - 2.7
• Galaxy Interactions Trigger Rapid Black Hole Growth: an unprecedented view from the Hyper Suprime-Cam Survey
• A definitive merger-AGN connection at z~0 with CFIS: mergers have an excess of AGN and AGN hosts are more frequently disturbed
• The MOSDEF Survey: Direct-Method Metallicities and ISM Conditions at $z\sim 1.5-3.5$
• Star formation is boosted (and quenched) from the inside out: radial star formation profiles from MaNGA
• The MOSDEF survey: a stellar mass-SFR-metallicity relation exists at $z\sim 2.3$
• The MOSDEF Survey: Significant Evolution in the Rest-Frame Optical Emission Line Equivalent Widths of Star-Forming Galaxies at z=1.4-3.8
• The MOSDEF Survey: the Variation of the Dust Attenuation Curve with Metallicity
• Hot dust in Panchromatic SED Fitting: Identification of AGN and improved galaxy properties
• The MOSDEF Survey: The First Direct Measurements of the Nebular Dust Attenuation Curve at High Redshift
• The MOSDEF survey: a census of AGN-driven ionized outflows at $z=1.4-3.8$
• The Effects of Stellar Population and Gas Covering Fraction on the Emergent Lyman Alpha Emission of High-Redshift Galaxies
• Infrared Selection of Obscured Active Galactic Nuclei in the COSMOS Field
• The MOSDEF Survey: Sulfur Emission-line Ratios Provide New Insights into Evolving ISM Conditions at High Redshift
• Identifying the subtle signatures of feedback from distant AGN using ALMA observations and the EAGLE hydrodynamical simulations
• The MOSDEF Survey: Kinematic and Structural Evolution of Star-Forming Galaxies at $1.4\le z\le 3.8$
• Crossing the Line: Active Galactic Nuclei in the Star-forming region of the BPT Diagram
• The MOSDEF Survey: Metallicity Dependence of the PAH Emission at High Redshift and Implications for 24 micron-inferred IR Luminosities and Star Formation Rates at z~2
• The Chandra Deep Fields: Lifting the Veil on Distant Active Galactic Nuclei and X-Ray Emitting Galaxies
• Two Growing Modes and the Morphology-Quiescence Relation in Galaxies
• The MOSDEF Survey: A Comprehensive Analysis of the Rest-optical Emission-line Properties of $z\sim 2.3$ Star-forming Galaxies
• Is there a relationship between AGN and star formation in IR-bright AGNs?
• The MOSDEF Survey: Implications of the Lack of Evolution in the Dust Attenuation-Mass Relation to z~2
• A Catalog of AGN Host Galaxies Observed with HST/ACS: Correlations between Star Formation and AGN Activity
• The MOSDEF survey: the prevalence and properties of galaxy-wide AGN-driven outflows at $z\sim 2$
• The MOSDEF Survey: The Metallicity Dependence of X-ray Binary Populations at $z\sim 2$
• A Preview of JWST Metallicity Studies at Cosmic Noon: The First Detection of Auroral [O II] Emission at High Redshift
• Atomic gas fractions in active galactic nucleus host galaxies
• A Uniformly Selected, All-Sky, Optical AGN Catalog
• Infrared Contributions of X-Ray Selected Active Galactic Nuclei in Dusty Star-Forming Galaxies
• AGN Selection Methods Have Profound Impacts on the Distributions of Host Galaxy Properties
• The Impact of Star-Formation-Rate Surface Density on the Electron Density and Ionization Parameter of High-Redshift Galaxies
• The MOSDEF Survey: The Mass-Metallicity relationship and the existence of the FMR at z~1.5
• The MOSDEF Survey: Environmental dependence of the gas-phase metallicity of galaxies at $1.4\le z\le 2.6$
• CO Emission, Molecular Gas, and Metallicity in Main-Sequence Star-Forming Galaxies at $z\sim 2.3$
• The MOSDEF Survey: Neon as a Probe of ISM Physical Conditions at High Redshift
• The VIMOS Public Extragalactic Redshift Survey (VIPERS). AGN feedback in [NeV] emitters
• A large, deep 3 deg${}^2$ survey of H$\alpha$, [OIII], and [OII] emitters from LAGER: constraining luminosity functions
• A Unique View of AGN-Driven Molecular Outflows: The Discovery of a Massive Galaxy Counterpart to a $z=2.4$ High-Metallicity Damped Lyman-$\alpha$ Absorber
• THE MOSDEF SURVEY: The Nature of Mid-Infrared Excess Galaxies and a Comparison of IR and UV Star Formation Tracers at z~2
• IR SED and Dust Masses of Sub-solar Metallicity Galaxies at z~2.3
• The Clustering of X-ray Luminous Quasars
• An Updated Dust-to-Star Geometry: Dust Attenuation Does Not Depend on Inclination in $1.3\le z\le 2.6$ Star-Forming Galaxies from MOSDEF
• Machine Learning Classifiers for Intermediate Redshift Emission Line Galaxies
• The Accretion History of AGN: A Newly Defined Population of Cold Quasars
• BASS. XXXVI. Constraining the Local Supermassive Black Hole - Halo Connection with BASS DR2 AGN
• Classifying the full SDSS-IV MaNGA Survey using optical diagnostic diagrams: presentation of AGN catalogs in flexible apertures
• The MOSDEF-LRIS Survey: Connection between Galactic-scale Outflows and the Properties of $z$~2 star-forming Galaxies
• The MOSDEF Survey: No Significant Enhancement in Star Formation or Deficit in Metallicity in Merging Galaxy Pairs at 1.5<=z<=3.5
• Imaging Spectroscopy of Ionized Gaseous Nebulae around Optically Faint AGN at Redshift z ~ 2
• The MOSDEF Survey: Differences in SFR and Metallicity for Morphologically-Selected Mergers at z~2
• Unravelling the Dust Attenuation Scaling Relations and their Evolution
• Environments of dwarf galaxies with optical AGN characteristics
• The MOSDEF-LRIS Survey: Probing ISM/CGM Structure of Star-Forming Galaxies at z~2 Using Rest-UV Spectroscopy
• The MOSDEF Survey: Stellar Continuum Spectra and Star Formation Histories of Active, Transitional, and Quiescent Galaxies at 1.4$<$\lowercase{z}$<$2.6
• AGN in the CALIFA survey: X-ray detection of nuclear sources
• A New Physical Picture for AGNs Lacking Optical Emission Lines
• The MOSDEF Survey: An Improved Voronoi Binning Technique on Spatially Resolved Stellar Populations at z~2
• The MOSDEF Survey: Calibrating the relationship between H$\alpha$ star-formation rate and radio continuum luminosity at $1.4<z<2.6$
• The MOSDEF-LRIS Survey: Detection of Inflowing Gas Towards Three Star-forming Galaxies at z ~ 2
• Exploring the Correlation between $\mathrm{H}\alpha$-to-UV Ratio and Burstiness for Typical Star-forming Galaxies at $z\sim 2$
• The MOSDEF Survey: The Dependence of H$\alpha$-to-UV SFR Ratios on SFR and Size at $z\sim 2$
• Disentangling the AGN and Star-Formation Contributions to the Radio-X-ray Emission of Radio-Loud Quasars at 1<z<2
• Accretion History of AGN: Estimating the Host Galaxy Properties in X-ray Luminous AGN from z=0-3
• Improved Measurements of Galaxy Star Formation Stochasticity from the Intrinsic Scatter of Burst Indicators
• A SysTematic seaRch fOr Dual Agns in meRgINg Galaxies (ASTRO-DARING) II: first results from long-slit spectroscopic observations
• Reconciling the Results of the z~2 MOSDEF and KBSS-MOSFIRE Surveys
• Spectroscopy of an extreme [OIII] emitting active galactic nucleus at $z=3.212$: implications for the reionisation era
• The MOSDEF Survey: Towards a Complete Census of the z ~ 2.3 Star-forming Galaxy Population
• What is the origin of the stacked radio emission in radio-undetected quasars?: Insights from a radio-infrared image stacking analysis
• X-Ray Redshifts of Obscured Chandra Source Catalog AGN
• The impact of AGN X-ray selection on the AGN halo occupation distribution
• pop-cosmos: Insights from generative modeling of a deep, infrared-selected galaxy population
• The MOSDEF Survey: Probing Resolved Stellar Populations at $z\sim 2$ Using a New Bayesian-defined Morphology Metric Called Patchiness
• The major merger-active galactic nucleus connection up to the cosmic noon
• Cosmological simulations predict that AGN preferentially live in gas-rich, star-forming galaxies despite effective feedback
• Physical Drivers of Emission Line Diversity of SDSS Seyfert 2s and LINERs After Removal of Contributions by Star Formation
• Constraining the AGN tori at cosmic noon using high-resolution JWST imaging and simultaneous SED fitting