English

Exploring the high-density reflection model for the soft excess in RBS 1124

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena 2024-09-04 v1

Abstract

'Bare' active galactic nuclei (AGN) are a subclass of Type 1 AGN that show little or no intrinsic absorption. They offer an unobscured view of the central regions of the AGN and therefore serve as ideal targets to study the relativistic reflection features originating from the innermost regions of the accretion disc. We present a detailed broadband spectral analysis (0.3700.3 - 70 keV) of one of the most luminous bare AGN in the local universe, RBS 1124 (z=0.208z= 0.208) using a new, co-ordinated high signal-to-noise observation obtained by XMM-Newton\textit{XMM-Newton} and NuSTAR\textit{NuSTAR}. The source exhibits a power-law continuum with Γ\Gamma \sim 1.8 along with a soft excess below 2 keV, a weak neutral iron line and curvature at high energies (30\sim 30 keV). The broadband spectrum, including the soft excess and the high-energy continuum, is well fit by the relativistic reflection model when the accretion disc is allowed to have densities of log(ne(n_{\rm e}/cm3^{-3}) 19.2\gtrsim 19.2. Our analysis therefore suggests that when high-density effects are considered, relativistic reflection remains a viable explanation for the soft excess.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2409.01395,
  title  = {Exploring the high-density reflection model for the soft excess in RBS 1124},
  author = {A. Madathil-Pottayil and D. J. Walton and Javier García and Jon Miller and Luigi C. Gallo and C. Ricci and Mark T. Reynolds and D. Stern and T. Dauser and Jiachen Jiang and William Alston and A. C. Fabian and M. J. Hardcastle and Peter Kosec and Emanuele Nardini and Christopher S. Reynolds},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2409.01395},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

14 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS

R2 v1 2026-06-28T18:31:49.584Z