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Related papers: Mergers Do Trigger AGNs out to z $\sim$ 0.6

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The evolution of our Universe is strongly influenced by the attractive force of gravity. A key aspect of this evolution, therefore, is the merging of galaxies. Here, we explore the role of mergers in shaping the properties of massive…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-06-12 Sugata Kaviraj

We present a study on the incidence of major mergers and their impact on the triggering of nuclear activity in 47 type I and 236 type II optically-selected AGN from the MaNGA DR15 sample. From an estimate of non-parametric image predictors…

Galactic nuclei are promising sites for stellar origin black hole (BH) mergers, as part of merger hierarchies in deep potential wells. We show that binary black hole (BBH) merger rates in active galactic nuclei (AGN) should always exceed…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2022-12-07 K. E. Saavik Ford , Barry McKernan

Bars are considered an efficient mechanism for transporting gas toward the central regions of galaxies, potentially enhancing nuclear activity. However, the extent to which bars influence active galactic nuclei (AGNs), and whether their…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-06-02 V. Marels , V. Mesa , M. Jaque Arancibia , S. Alonso , G. Coldwell , G. Damke , V. Contreras Rojas

Context. Active galactic nuclei (AGN) of galaxies play an important role in the life and evolution of galaxies due to the impact they exert on certain properties and the evolutionary path of galaxies. It is well known that infrared (IR)…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2022-08-24 Carlos G. Bornancini , Gabriel A. Oio , M. Victoria Alonso , Diego García Lambas

The astrophysical origin of gravitational wave (GW) transients is a timely open question in the wake of discoveries by LIGO/Virgo. In active galactic nuclei (AGNs), binaries form and evolve efficiently by interaction with a dense population…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2021-01-27 Hiromichi Tagawa , Bence Kocsis , Zoltan Haiman , Imre Bartos , Kazuyuki Omukai , Johan Samsing

There is some weak evidence that the black hole merger named GW190521 had a non-zero eccentricity. In addition, the component black holes' masses exceeded the limit predicted by stellar evolution. The large masses can be explained by…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2023-03-15 J. Samsing , I. Bartos , D. J. D'Orazio , Z. Haiman , B. Kocsis , N. W. C. Leigh , B. Liu , M. E. Pessah , H. Tagawa

Physical processes such as re-ignition, enhancement, and fading of active galactic nuclei (AGN) are not entirely understood because the timeline of these events is expected to last many years. However, it is well known that the differences…

Galaxy mergers play an important role in the growth of galaxies and their supermassive black holes. Simulations suggest that tidal interactions could enhance black hole accretion, which can be tested by the fraction of binary active…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2015-06-23 Hai Fu , A. D. Myers , S. G. Djorgovski , Lin Yan , J. M. Wrobel , A. Stockton

We present the study of an X-ray selected sample of active galactic nuclei (AGN) in pairs at projected spatial separations 1 <$ r_p$/kpc < 100 at z < 0.1, using XMM-Newton and Chandra data. The pair sample is derived from an initial pool of…

The origin of the black hole mergers detected by LIGO and Virgo remains an open question. While the unusual mass and spin of a few events constrain their possible astrophysical formation mechanisms, it is difficult to classify the bulk of…

General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology · Physics 2021-10-27 V. Gayathri , Y. Yang , H. Tagawa , Z. Haiman , I. Bartos

It is widely believed that ultraluminous infrared (IR) galaxies and active galactic nuclei (AGN) activity are triggered by galaxy interactions and merging, with the peak of activity occurring at z~2, where submillimetre galaxies are…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2015-05-18 Kristen Coppin , Alexandra Pope , Karin Menendez-Delmestre , David M. Alexander , James Dunlop

A key unresolved question is the role that galaxy mergers play in driving stellar mass growth over cosmic time. Recent observational work hints at the possibility that the overall contribution of `major' mergers (mass ratios $\gtrsim$1:4)…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2017-09-07 G. Martin , S. Kaviraj , J. E. G. Devriendt , Y. Dubois , C. Laigle , C. Pichon

The accretion disks of active galactic nuclei (AGN) are promising locations for the merger of compact objects detected by gravitational wave (GW) observatories. Embedded within a baryon-rich, high density environment, mergers within AGN are…

Galaxy mergers are fundamental drivers of galaxy evolution and black hole (BH) growth across cosmic time. We use the Horizon-AGN simulation to investigate the fraction of galaxy pairs, the merger fraction, and the galaxy merger rate over a…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-05-14 Ecaterina Leonova , Marta Volonteri , Clotilde Laigle , Samaya Nissanke , Pascal A. Oesch , Yohan Dubois

Stellar-mass black holes (BHs) embedded in active galactic nuclei (AGN) may be major sources of astrophysical gravitational waves (GWs), contributing both to the observed LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA population of binary BH mergers and to future…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2024-10-29 Shmuel Gilbaum , Evgeni Grishin , Nicholas C. Stone , Ilya Mandel

Hierarchical models of galaxy formation predict that galaxy mergers represent a significant transitional stage of rapid supermassive black hole (SMBH) growth. Yet, the connection between the merging process and enhanced active galactic…

We perform a quantitative morphological comparison between the hosts of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) and quiescent galaxies at intermediate redshifts (z~0.7). The imaging data are taken from the large HST/ACS mosaics of the GEMS and STAGES…

Radio activity in AGN (Active Galactic Nuclei) produce feedback on the host galaxy via the impact of the relativistic jets on the circumnuclear gas. Although radio jets can reach up to several times the optical radius of the host galaxy, in…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2023-03-22 Guilherme S. Couto , Thaisa Storchi-Bergmann

Active galactic nuclei (AGN) are a promising source of the binary black hole (BBH) mergers observed in gravitational waves with LIGO-Virgo-Kagra (LVK). Constraining the AGN channel allows us to limit AGN parameter space (disk density, size,…