Chemical abundances in Seyfert galaxies -- VII. Direct abundance determination of neon based on optical and infrared emission lines

Abstract

For the first time, neon abundance has been derived in the narrow line region from a sample of Seyfert~2 nuclei. In view of this, we compiled from the literature fluxes of optical and infrared (IR) narrow emission lines for 35 Seyfert 2 nuclei in the local universe ($z<0.06$). The relative intensities of emission lines were used to derive the ionic and total neon and oxygen abundances through electron temperature estimations ($T_e$-method). For the neon, abundance estimates were obtained by using both $T_e$-method and IR-method. Based on photoionization model results, we found a lower electron temperature [$t_e([NeIII])$] for the gas phase where the Ne${}^{2+}$ is located in comparison with $t_3$ for the O${}^{2+}$ ion. We find that the differences (D) between Ne${}^{2+}$/H${}^{+}$ ionic abundances calculated from IR-method and $T_e-$method (assuming $t_3$ in the Ne${}^{2+}$/H${}^{+}$ derivation) are similar to the derivations in star-forming regions (SFs) and they are reduced by a mean factor of $\sim 3$ when $t_e([NeIII])$ is considered. We propose a semi-empirical Ionization Correction Factor (ICF) for the neon, based on [Ne II]12.81$\mu$m, [\ion{Ne}{iii}]15.56$\mu$m and oxygen ionic abundance ratios. We find that the average Ne/H abundance for the Seyfert 2s sample is nearly 2 times higher than similar estimate for SFs. Finally, for the very high metallicity regime (i.e. [$12+log(O/H)>8.80$]) an increase in Ne/O with O/H is found, which likely indicates secondary stellar production for the neon.

Accepted for publication by MNRAS

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