Helical Jet in the Gravitationally Lensed Blazar PKS1830-211

Abstract

Recent radio VLBI observations of the complex gravitationally lensed system PKS1830-211 have thrown up some questions with regard to the processes occuring at the heart of the blazar source at a redshift of 2.51, which is viewed almost straight down the jet axis. This work links, by a model of a helical jet tracked by ballistically ejected plasmons from a precessing nozzle, observations on the scale of tens of microarcseconds to those on the scale of milliarcseconds. An observed jet precession period of 1.08 years is inferred from the model, translating to an intrinsic period of 30.8 years for a source at redshift 2.51 and an assumed jet bulk velocity of 0.99 c. This fits well with the picture of an active galactic nucleus hosting a binary black hole system at its centre, with the jet emitted by one member of the system, and the precession as being due to its orbital motion around its companion.

Accepted for publication in the MNRAS

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Cited by in corpus (22)

• Molecules at z=0.89: A 4-mm-rest-frame absorption line survey toward PKS 1830-211
• A precise and accurate determination of the cosmic microwave background temperature at z=0.89
• A comprehensive power spectral density analysis of astronomical time series I: the Fermi-LAT gamma-ray light curves of selected blazars
• An ALMA Early Science survey of molecular absorption lines toward PKS1830-211 -- Analysis of the absorption profiles
• Drastic changes in the molecular absorption at redshift z=0.89 toward the quasar PKS 1830-211
• Illuminating the past 8 billion years of cold gas towards two gravitationally lensed quasars
• Probing the jet base of the blazar PKS1830-211 from the chromatic variability of its lensed images. Serendipitous ALMA observations of a strong gamma-ray flare
• OH+ and H2O+ absorption toward PKS1830-211
• Long-term variability of extragalactic radio sources in the Planck Early Release Compact Source Catalogue
• Multiwavelength study of Cygnus A I. Precession and slow jet speeds from radio observations
• New molecular species at redshift z=0.89
• Detection of CH+, SH+, and their 13C- and 34S- isotopologues toward PKS1830-211
• Resolving the High Energy Universe with Strong Gravitational Lensing: The Case of PKS 1830-211
• A study of submillimeter methanol absorption toward PKS1830-211: Excitation, invariance of the proton-electron mass ratio, and systematics
• PKS1830-211: OH and HI at z=0.89 and the first MeerKAT UHF spectrum
• The inhomogeneous ISM toward PKS1830-211 SW - A detailed view on molecular gas at a look-back time of 7.5 Gyr
• The Search for Extragalactic Lithium Hydride
• Submillimeter polarization and variability of quasar PKS 1830-211
• Optical variability in IBL S5 0716+714 during the 2013-2015 outburst
• Cosmo-tomography toward PKS1830-211: Variability of the quasar and of its foreground molecular absorption monitored with ALMA
• Gravitational Lensing of Anisotropic Sources
• Milliarcsecond X-ray astrometry to resolve inner regions of AGN at $z>1$ using gravitational lensing