Host galaxy and orientation differences between AGN different types

Abstract

Aims.The main purpose of this study is to investigate aspects regarding the validity of the active galactic nucleus (AGN) unification paradigm (UP). In particular, we focus on the AGN host galaxies, which according to the UP should show no systematic differences depending on the AGN classification. Methods.For the purpose of this study, we used (a) the spectroscopic Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Data Release (DR) 14 catalogue, in order to select and classify AGNs using emission line diagnostics, up to a redshift of z=0.2, and (b) the Galaxy Zoo Project catalogue, which classifies SDSS galaxies in two broad Hubble types: spirals and ellipticals. Results.We find that the fraction of type 1 Seyfert nuclei (Sy1) hosted in elliptical galaxies is significantly larger than the corresponding fraction of any other AGN type, while there is a gradient of increasing spiral-hosts from Sy1 to LINER, type 2 Seyferts (Sy2) and composite nuclei. These findings cannot be interpreted within the simple unified model, but possibly by a co-evolution scheme for supermassive black holes (SMBH) and galactic bulges. Furthermore, for the case of spiral host galaxies we find the Sy1 population to be strongly skewed towards face-on configurations, while the corresponding Sy2 population range in all host galaxy orientation configurations has a similar, but not identical, orientation distribution to star-forming (SF) galaxies. These results also cannot be interpreted by the standard unification paradigm, but point towards a significant contribution of the galactic disc to the obscuration of the nuclear region. This is also consistent with the observed preference of Sy1 nuclei to be hosted by ellipticals, that is, the dusty disc of spiral hosts contributes to the obscuration of the broad-line region (BLR), and thus relatively more ellipticals are expected to appear hosting Sy1 nuclei.

arXiv commentAccepted for publication in A&A

References in corpus (72)

• Unified Schemes for Radio-Loud Active Galactic Nuclei
• A Fundamental Relation Between Supermassive Black Holes and Their Host Galaxies
• Coevolution (Or Not) of Supermassive Black Holes and Host Galaxies
• The Demography of Massive Dark Objects in Galaxy Centres
• Cosmic Star Formation History
• A Relationship Between Nuclear Black Hole Mass and Galaxy Velocity Dispersion
• The Origin of the Mass--Metallicity Relation: Insights from 53,000 Star-Forming Galaxies in the SDSS
• Modeling feedback from stars and black holes in galaxy mergers
• A Unified, Merger-Driven Model for the Origin of Starbursts, Quasars, the Cosmic X-Ray Background, Supermassive Black Holes and Galaxy Spheroids
• UV Star Formation Rates in the Local Universe
• A Cosmological Framework for the Co-Evolution of Quasars, Supermassive Black Holes, and Elliptical Galaxies: I. Galaxy Mergers & Quasar Activity
• Galaxy Zoo : Morphologies derived from visual inspection of galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
• The Dependence of Star Formation History and Internal Structure on Stellar Mass for 10^5 Low-Redshift Galaxies
• The Co-Evolution of Galaxies and Supermassive Black Holes: Insights from Surveys of the Contemporary Universe
• Revisiting the Unified Model of Active Galactic Nuclei
• A Hubble Space Telescope Imaging Survey of Nearby Active Glactic Nuclei
• The AGN Obscuring Torus -- End of the "Doughnut" Paradigm?
• Obscured Active Galactic Nuclei
• A Cosmological Framework for the Co-Evolution of Quasars, Supermassive Black Holes, and Elliptical Galaxies: II. Formation of Red Ellipticals
• Jet directions in Seyfert galaxies
• On the Disappearance of the Broad-Line Region in Low-Luminosity Agns
• Hidden Broad Line Seyfert 2 Galaxies in the CfA and 12micron Samples
• Testing the Unification Model for AGN in the Infrared: are the obscuring tori of Type 1 and 2 Seyferts different?
• The Constant Average Relationship between Dust-obscured Star Formation and Stellar Mass from $z=0$ to $z=2.5$
• On the Unification of Active Galactic Nuclei
• Evolution of Broad-line Emission from Active Galactic Nuclei
• The Unified Model & Evolution of Active Galaxies: Implications from a Spectropolarimetric Study
• Deep Silicate absorption features in Compton-thick AGN predominantly arise due to dust in the host galaxy
• The Lack of BLR in Low Accretion Rate AGN as Evidence of their Origin in the Accretion Disk
• Testing the Unified Model with an Infrared Selected Sample of Seyfert Galaxies
• Why X-ray--Selected AGN Appear Optically Dull
• AGN vs. host galaxy properties in the COSMOS field
• Galaxy gas as obscurer: II. Separating the galaxy-scale and nuclear obscurers of Active Galactic Nuclei
• On the relation of optical obscuration and X-ray absorption in Seyfert galaxies
• Black-Hole Growth is Mainly Linked to Host-Galaxy Stellar Mass rather than Star Formation Rate
• Large amounts of optically-obscured star formation in the host galaxies of some type-2 quasars
• The Host-Galaxy Properties of Type 1 Versus Type 2 Active Galactic Nuclei
• The Mid-Infrared Emission of M87
• Evident black hole-bulge coevolution in the distant universe
• Multi-wavelength properties of Type 1 and Type 2 AGN Host Galaxies in the Chandra-COSMOS Legacy Survey
• Chandra-SDSS Normal and Star-Forming Galaxies I: X-ray Source Properties of Galaxies Detected by Chandra in SDSS DR2
• Local and Large scale Environment of Seyfert Galaxies
• The Swift/BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey -- IX. The Clustering Environments of an Unbiased Sample of Local AGN
• The BeppoSAX High Energy Large Area Survey -V. The nature of the hard X-ray source populations and its evolution
• The Nature of Optically Dull Active Galactic Nuclei in COSMOS
• Host galaxy-active galactic nucleus alignments in the SDSS-DR7
• A Connection between Obscuration and Star Formation in Luminous Quasars
• The central parsecs of active galactic nuclei: challenges to the torus
• The different neighbours around Type-1 and Type-2 active galactic nuclei
• The characteristic halo masses of half-a-million WISE-selected quasars
• Probing the Active Galactic Nuclei Unified Model Torus Properties in Seyfert Galaxies
• The relation between AGN type and host galaxy properties
• A mid-IR study of Hickson Compact Groups I : Probing the Effects of Environment in Galaxy Interactions
• The Circum-Galactic Environment of Bright IRAS Galaxies
• The Environment of Active Galaxies in the SDSS-DR4
• The Activity of the Neighbours of Seyfert Galaxies
• Differences in Halo-Scale Environments between Type 1 and Type 2 AGNs at Low Redshift
• X-ray absorption in INTEGRAL AGN: Host galaxy inclination
• On the dichotomy of Seyfert 2 galaxies: intrinsic differences and evolution
• Optical multiband surface photometry of a sample of Seyfert galaxies. I. Large-scale morphology and local environment analysis of matched Seyfert and inactive galaxy samples
• Induced nuclear activity in galaxy pairs with different morphologies (E+E), (E+S) and (S+S)
• Deficiency of Broad Line AGNs in Compact Groups of Galaxies
• AGN luminosity and stellar age -- two missing ingredients for AGN unification as seen with iPTF supernovae
• Morphology of AGN Emission Line Regions in SDSS-IV MaNGA Survey
• Active Galaxy Nuclei at high redshifts: properties and environment of Type 1 and 2 AGNs
• A unifying evolutionary framework for infrared-selected obscured and unobscured quasar host haloes
• Host galaxy properties and environment of obscured and unobscured X-ray selected Active Galactic Nuclei in the COSMOS survey
• Morphology of Seyfert Galaxies
• XXL Survey XXI. The environment and clustering of X-ray AGN in the XXL-South field
• AGN types and unification model
• Environment of $1\le z\le 2$ obscured and unobscured AGNs in the Extended Chandra Deep Field South
• Most supermassive black hole growth is obscured by dust

Cited by in corpus (7)

• An empirical relation to estimate host galaxy stellar light from AGN spectra
• The local Universe in the era of large surveys -- II. Multi-wavelength characterisation of activity in nearby S0 galaxies
• XXL-HSC: Host properties of X-ray detected AGNs in XXL clusters
• Remarkably high mass and high velocity dispersion of molecular gas associated with a regular, absorption-selected type-I quasar
• The viewing angle in AGN SED models, a data-driven analysis
• BASS. XLIV. Morphological preferences of local hard X-ray selected AGN
• Variability Selected Active Galactic Nuclei from ASAS-SN Survey: Constraining the Low Luminosity AGN Population