Related papers: AGN dust tori at low and high luminosities
Infrared observations of active galactic nucleus (AGN) reveal emission from the putative dusty circumnuclear 'torus' invoked by AGN unification, that is heated up by radiation from the central accreting black hole (BH). The strong 9.7 and…
Quasars and Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) are often obscured by dust and gas. It is normally assumed that the obscuration occurs in an oblate "obscuring torus", that begins at the radius at which the most refractive dust can remain solid.…
We present 8-13 micron imaging and spectroscopy of 9 type 1 and 10 type 2 AGN obtained with the VLT/VISIR instrument at spatial resolution <100 pc. The emission from the host galaxy sources is resolved out in most cases. The silicate…
We construct an X-ray spectral model for the clumpy torus in an active galactic nucleus (AGN) using Geant4, which includes the physical processes of the photoelectric effect, Compton scattering, Rayleigh scattering, $\gamma$ conversion,…
The origin of obscuration in Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) is still an open debate. In particular, it is unclear what drives the relative contributions to the line-of-sight column densities from galaxy-scale and torus-linked obscuration. The…
We use a sample of 151 local non-blazar AGN selected from the INTEGRAL all-sky hard X-ray survey to investigate if the observed declining trend of the fraction of obscured (i.e. showing X-ray absorption) AGN with increasing luminosity is…
Dust reprocesses the intrinsic radiation of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) to emerge at longer wavelengths. The observed mid-infrared (MIR) luminosity depends fundamentally on the luminosity of the central engine, but in detail it also…
We quantify the luminosity contribution of active galactic nuclei (AGN) to the 12 $\mu$m, mid-infrared (MIR; 5-38 $\mu$m), and the total IR (5-1000 $\mu$m) emission in the local AGN detected in the all-sky 70-month Swift/Burst Alert…
The "torus" is the central element of the most popular theory unifying various classes of AGNs, but it is usually described as "putative" because it has not been imaged yet. Since it is too small to be resolved with single-dish telescopes,…
We present calculations of AGN winds at ~parsec scales, along with the associated obscuration. We take into account the pressure of infrared radiation on dust grains and the interaction of X-rays from a central black hole with hot and cold…
We present a statistical analysis of the properties of the obscuring material around active galactic nuclei (AGN). This study represents the first of its kind for an ultra-hard X-ray (14-195keV; Swift/BAT) volume-limited (DL<40 Mpc) sample…
Tori of Active Galactic Nuclei are made up of a mixture of hot and cold gas, as well as dust. In order to protect the dust grains from destruction by the hot gas as well as by the energetic radiation of the accretion disk, the dust is often…
This work focuses on the properties of dusty tori in active galactic nuclei (AGN) derived from the comparison of SDSS type 1 quasars with mid-Infrared (MIR) counterparts and a new, detailed torus model. The infrared data were taken by the…
Obscured AGNs provide an opportunity to study the material surrounding the central engine. Geometric and physical constraints on the absorber can be deduced from the reprocessed AGN emission. In particular, the obscuring gas may reprocess…
We present results from a survey of nearby AGN using the near infrared adaptive optics integral field spectrograph SINFONI. These data enable us to probe the distribution and kinematics of the gas and stars at spatial resolutions as small…
We present new mid-infrared (MIR) imaging data for three Type-1 Seyfert galaxies obtained with T-ReCS on the Gemini-South Telescope at subarcsecond resolution. Our aim is to enlarge the sample studied in a previous work to compare the…
We present measurements of the dusty torus sizes of 51 active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with a redshift of $z<$ 0.8. Our analysis utilizes about 16 years of optical photometric data of 146 AGNs from various time-domain surveys, including…
We use mid-infrared spectral decomposition to separate the 6micron mid-infrared AGN continuum from the host emission in the ISO low resolution spectra of 71 active galaxies and compare the results to observed and intrinsic 2-10keV hard…
Advancements in infrared IR open up the possibility to spatially resolve AGN on the parsec-scale level and study the circumnuclear dust distribution, commonly referred to as the "dust torus", that is held responsible for the type 1/type 2…
Dust plays a central role in the unification theory of active galactic nuclei (AGNs). However, little is known about the nature (e.g., size, composition) of the dust which forms a torus around the AGN. In this Letter we report a systematic…