Updated Picture of the Active Galactic Nuclei with Dusty/Dust-free Gas Structures and Effects of the Radiation Pressure

Abstract

This study investigates the properties of two gas structures of X-ray selected active galactic nuclei (AGNs), that is, dusty and dust-free gas components, by separating them with the line-of-sight dust extinction ($A_V$) and the neutral gas column density ($N_{\mathrm{H}}$). The typical column density of the dusty and dust-free gas differs depending on the Seyfert type, indicating that both structures have anisotropic column density distributions. The number of targets with the dusty gas column density ($N_{\mathrm{H},\mathrm{d}}$) of $\log N_{\mathrm{H},\mathrm{d}}[\mathrm{c}{\mathrm{m}}^{-2}]>23$ is much smaller than that with the same column density of the dust-free gas. This result indicates that the optically-thick part of the dusty gas structure is very thin. There are very few targets with a larger Eddington ratio ($f_{\mathrm{Edd}}$) than the effective Eddington limit of the dusty gas and the covering factor of the dusty gas with $22\le \log N_{\mathrm{H},\mathrm{d}}[\mathrm{c}{\mathrm{m}}^{-2}]<24$ exhibits a clear drop at the effective Eddington limit. These results support the scenario wherein the covering factor of the dusty torus decreases in a high Eddington ratio owing to the radiation-driven dusty gas outflow. The covering factor of the dust-free gas with the column density ($N_{\mathrm{H},\mathrm{df}}$) of $22\le \log N_{\mathrm{H},\mathrm{df}}[\mathrm{c}{\mathrm{m}}^{-2}]<24$ similarly exhibits the decrease in high Eddington ratio, although it may be owing to the dust-free gas outflow driven by certain other mechanisms than the radiation pressure. Finally, we propose an updated picture of the AGN gas structure based on our results and the literature.

arXiv comment16 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS

References in corpus (96)

• The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE): Mission Description and Initial On-orbit Performance
• Unified Schemes for Radio-Loud Active Galactic Nuclei
• Correcting for the Effects of Interstellar Extinction
• Observational Evidence of AGN Feedback
• The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) Mission
• The Low-Luminosity End of the Radius-Luminosity Relationship for Active Galactic Nuclei
• The 70 Month Swift-BAT All-Sky Hard X-Ray Survey
• An X-ray spectral study of 24 type-1 AGN
• BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey - V. X-ray properties of the Swift/BAT 70-month AGN catalog
• Piecing Together the X-ray Background: Bolometric Corrections for Active Galactic Nuclei
• Obscured Active Galactic Nuclei
• Reverberation Measurements of the Inner Radius of the Dust Torus in Nearby Seyfert 1 Galaxies
• Dust in active nuclei. I. Evidence for "anomalous" properties
• The nature and origin of Seyfert warm absorbers
• Ubiquitous variability of X-ray absorbing column densities in Seyfert 2 Galaxies
• The close environments of accreting massive black holes are shaped by radiative feedback
• BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey I: Spectral Measurements, Derived Quantities, and AGN Demographics
• A diversity of dusty AGN tori: Data release for the VLTI/MIDI AGN Large Program and first results for 23 galaxies
• Explaining changing-look AGN with state transition triggered by rapid mass accretion rate drop
• Reverberation Measurements of the Inner Radius of the Dust Torus in 17 Seyfert Galaxies
• What the Optical Recombination Lines Can Tell Us About the Broad Line Regions of Active Galactic Nuclei
• Empirical determination of the shape of dust attenuation curves in star-forming galaxies
• Dust in the polar region as a major contributor to the IR emission of AGN
• The dusty torus in the Circinus galaxy: a dense disk and the torus funnel
• Dust in active nuclei. II. Powder or gravel?
• Resolving the obscuring torus in NGC 1068 with the power of infrared interferometry: Revealing the inner funnel of dust
• A soft X-ray study of Type I AGN observed with Chandra HETGS
• Ionized outflows from active galactic nuclei as the essential elements of feedback
• Thick tori around AGN: the case for extended tori and consequences for their X-ray and IR emission
• The Nuclear Reddening Curve for Active Galactic Nuclei and the Shape of the Infra-Red to X-Ray Spectral Energy Distribution
• Radiation-driven Fountain and Origin of Torus around Active Galactic Nuclei
• The effect of radiation pressure on dusty absorbing gas around AGN
• Warm absorbers in X-rays (WAX), a comprehensive high resolution grating spectral study of a sample of Seyfert galaxies: I. A global view and frequency of occurrence of warm absorbers
• Parsec-scale dust emission from the polar region in the type 2 nucleus of NGC 424
• Chandra-HETGS Observations of the Brightest Flare Seen from Sgr A*
• Dust inflated accretion disc as the origin of the Broad Line Region in Active Galactic Nuclei
• ALMA images the many faces of the NGC1068 torus and its surroundings
• The subarcsecond mid-infrared view of local active galactic nuclei: III. Polar dust emission
• BASS XXII: The BASS DR2 AGN Catalog and Data
• Warm absorbers in active galactic nuclei
• The Galaxy Activity, Torus and Outflow Survey (GATOS) I. ALMA images of dusty molecular tori in Seyfert galaxies
• Redefining the torus: A unifying view of AGN in the infrared and sub-mm
• Mid-infrared interferometry of 23 AGN tori: On the significance of polar-elongated emission
• AGN Obscuration and the Unified Model
• How complex is the obscuration in AGN? New clues from the Suzaku monitoring of the X-ray absorbers in NGC7582
• Radiative pressure feedback by a quasar in a galactic bulge
• An image of the dust sublimation region in the nucleus of NGC 1068
• Multi-phase Nature of a Radiation-Driven Fountain with Nuclear Starburst in a Low-mass Active Galactic Nucleus
• BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey - XI. The Covering Factor of Dust and Gas in Swift/BAT Active Galactic Nuclei
• Counter-Rotation and High Velocity Outflow in the Parsec-Scale Molecular Torus of NGC 1068
• The Swift BAT-detected Seyfert 1 Galaxies: X-ray Broadband Properties and Warm Absorbers
• Radiation pressure and absorption in AGN: results from a complete unbiased sample from Swift
• Thermal imaging of dust hiding the black hole in the Active Galaxy NGC 1068
• Quantifying the Diffuse Continuum Contribution of BLR Clouds to AGN Continuum Inter-band Delays
• On the relation of optical obscuration and X-ray absorption in Seyfert galaxies
• Long-term IR Photometry of Seyferts
• New evidence for the ubiquity of prominent polar dust emission in AGN on tens of parsec scales
• Near-infrared spectroscopy of nearby Seyfert galaxies - II. Molecular content and coronal emission
• The case for cases B and C: intrinsic hydrogen line ratios of the broad-line region of active galactic nuclei, reddenings, and accretion disc sizes
• Mid-IR Variability and Dust Reverberation Mapping of Low-$z$ Quasars. I. Data, Methods and Basic Results
• BASS XXV: DR2 Broad-line Based Black Hole Mass Estimates and Biases from Obscuration
• Time-resolved infrared emission from radiation-driven central obscuring structures in Active Galactic Nuclei
• Orientation Effects on the Inner Region of Dusty Torus of Active Galactic Nuclei
• New evidence for the dusty wind model: Polar dust and a hot core in the type-1 Seyfert ESO323-G77
• BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey XXI: The Data Release 2 Overview
• Reverberation Measurements of the Inner Radii of the Dust Tori in Quasars
• BASS XXXVII: The role of radiative feedback in the growth and obscuration properties of nearby supermassive black holes
• Constraints on the Broad Line Region Properties and Extinction in Local Seyferts
• The dusty heart of Circinus: I. Imaging the circumnuclear dust in N-band
• Systematic Study of AGN Clumpy Tori with Broadband X-ray Spectroscopy: Updated Unified Picture of AGN Structure
• Thermally driven wind as the origin of warm absorbers in AGN
• Dust Reverberation Mapping in Distant Quasars from Optical and Mid-Infrared Imaging Surveys
• Polar dust obscuration in broad-line active galaxies from the XMM-XXL field
• Relation between winds and jets in radio-loud AGN
• Revisiting the "forbidden" region: AGN radiative feedback with radiation trapping
• The dust-gas AGN torus as constrained from X-ray and mid-infrared observations
• BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey--VIII. Type 1 AGN With Massive Absorbing Columns
• BASS XXIX: The near-infrared view of the BLR: the effects of obscuration in BLR characterisation
• Hard X-Ray to Radio Multiwavelength SED Analysis of Local U/LIRGs in GOALS Sample with Self-consistent AGN Model Including Polar-dust Component
• The complex X-ray absorbers of NGC 3516 observed by BeppoSAX
• Probing the Structure and Evolution of BASS AGN through Eddington Ratios
• Probing the nature and origin of dust in the reddened quasar IC 4329A with global modelling from X-ray to infrared
• The Dust-to-Gas Ratio and the Role of Radiation Pressure in Luminous, Obscured Quasars
• Changing-look Active Galactic Nuclei
• Space Telescope and Optical Reverberation Mapping Project. XI. Disk-wind characteristics and contributions to the very broad emission lines of NGC 5548
• Narrow Fe-K$\alpha$ Reverberation Mapping Unveils the Deactivated Broad-Line Region in a Changing-Look Active Galactic Nucleus
• Multiphase Gas Nature in the Sub-parsec Region of the Active Galactic Nuclei I: Dynamical Structures of Dusty and Dust-free Outflow
• AGN STORM 2: II. Ultraviolet Observations of Mrk817 with the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph on the Hubble Space Telescope
• Compton-thick AGN in the NuSTAR Era. IX. A Joint NuSTAR and XMM-Newton Analysis of Four Local AGN
• Warm Absorbers in the Radiation-driven Fountain Model of Low-mass Active Galactic Nuclei
• Thermal Infrared 3--5 $\mu$m Colors of Obscured and Unobscured Active Galactic Nuclei
• Dust Reverberation Mapping of Type 2 AGN NGC 2110 Realized with X-ray and 3-5 $\mu$m IR monitoring
• Measurement of AGN dust extinction based on the near-infrared flux variability of WISE data
• Active galactic nuclei with high-resolution X-ray spectroscopy
• X-ray absorption and 9.7 um silicate feature as a probe of AGN torus structure
• BASS XLII: The relation between the covering factor of dusty gas and the Eddington ratio in nearby active galactic nuclei