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A near-infrared relationship for estimating black hole masses in active galactic nuclei

Landt, H.; Ward, M.J.; Peterson, B.M.; Bentz, M.C.; Elvis, M.; Korista, K.T.; Karovska, M.

A near-infrared relationship for estimating black hole masses in active galactic nuclei Thumbnail


Authors

H. Landt

B.M. Peterson

M.C. Bentz

M. Elvis

K.T. Korista

M. Karovska



Abstract

Black hole masses for samples of active galactic nuclei (AGN) are currently estimated from single-epoch optical spectra using scaling relations anchored in reverberation mapping results. In particular, the two quantities needed for calculating black hole masses, namely the velocity and the radial distance of the orbiting gas are derived from the widths of the Balmer hydrogen broad emission lines and the optical continuum luminosity, respectively. We have recently presented a near-infrared (near-IR) relationship for estimating AGN black hole masses based on the widths of the Paschen hydrogen broad emission lines and the total 1 μm continuum luminosity. The near-IR offers several advantages over the optical: it suffers less from dust extinction, the AGN continuum is observed only weakly contaminated by the host galaxy and the strongest Paschen broad emission lines Paα and Paβ are unblended. Here, we improve the calibration of the near-IR black hole mass relationship by increasing the sample from 14 to 23 reverberation-mapped AGN using additional spectroscopy obtained with the Gemini Near-Infrared Spectrograph. The additional sample improves the number statistics in particular at the high-luminosity end.

Citation

Landt, H., Ward, M., Peterson, B., Bentz, M., Elvis, M., Korista, K., & Karovska, M. (2013). A near-infrared relationship for estimating black hole masses in active galactic nuclei. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 432(1), 113-126. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stt421

Journal Article Type Article
Publication Date Jun 1, 2013
Deposit Date May 29, 2014
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Print ISSN 0035-8711
Electronic ISSN 1365-2966
Publisher Royal Astronomical Society
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 432
Issue 1
Pages 113-126
DOI https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stt421
Keywords Galaxies: active, Galaxies: nuclei, Quasars: general, Infrared: galaxies.

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Copyright Statement
This article has been accepted for publication in Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society © 2013 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.





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