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Related papers: On the Extremely X-ray Variable Active Galactic Nu…

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We present the results of our search for highly variable active galactic nuclei (AGNs) the X-ray flux from which changed by more than an order of magnitude during the SRG/eROSITA all-sky survey. Using the eROSITA data obtained in the period…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2023-09-21 Pavel Medvedev , Marat Gilfanov , Sergey Sazonov , Rashid Sunyaev , Georgii Khorunzhev

While theory and simulations indicate that galaxy mergers play an important role in the cosmological evolution of accreting black holes and their host galaxies, samples of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) in galaxies at close separations are…

Surveys have revealed a class of object displaying both high X-ray luminosities (Lx > 10^42 erg/s), and a lack of a discernible active galactic nucleus (AGN) in the optical band. If these sources are powered by star formation activity…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2015-06-03 F. E. Jackson , T. P. Roberts , D. M. Alexander , J. M. Gelbord , A. D. Goulding , M. J. Ward , J. L. Wardlow , M. G. Watson

We investigate the link between optical obscuration and X-ray absorption in active galactic nuclei (AGN) by combining X-ray spectroscopy from 4XMM-DR11 with SDSS DR16Q spectroscopy. Bayesian X-ray spectral fits were obtained within the…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-04-22 G. Mountrichas , F. J. Carrera , E. Quintin , A. Viitanen , A. Corral , N. Webb

We present a detailed study of the optical spectroscopic properties of 12 active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with candidate low-mass black holes (BHs) selected by Kamizasa et al. through rapid X-ray variability. The high-quality, echellette…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2016-04-20 Luis Ho , Minjin Kim

It is known that some active galactic nuclei (AGNs) transited from type 1 to type 2 or vice versa. There are two explanations for the so-called changing look AGNs: one is the dramatic change of the obscuration along the line-of-sight, the…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2017-09-01 Zhenfeng Sheng , Tinggui Wang , Ning Jiang , Chenwei Yang , Lin Yan , Liming Dou , Bo Peng

Context. Changing-look active galactic nuclei (CL-AGNs) challenge the unified model of AGNs and offer key insights into the physics of the accretion processes of super-massive black holes. While systematic spectroscopic comparisons have…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-05-26 Litao Zhu , Zhongxiang Wang , Alok C. Gupta , P. U. Devanand , Ruoheng Yang , Qiangmeng Huang , Man Lang , Jiawen Li

Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) are known to be variable across all wavelengths. Significant observational efforts have been invested in the last decade in studying their ultraviolet (UV) and optical variability. Long and densely sampled,…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2024-09-17 M. Papoutsis , I. E. Papadakis , C. Panagiotou , M. Dovčiak , E. Kammoun

We present the X-ray spectra of 86 optically-identified sources in the 13H XMM-Newton/Chandra deep field which have >70 X-ray counts. The sample consists of 50 broad line AGN, 25 narrow emission line galaxies, 6 absorption line galaxies,…

Rapid, large amplitude variability at optical to X-ray wavelengths is now seen in an increasing number of Seyfert galaxies and luminous quasars. The variations imply a global change in accretion power, but are too rapid to be communicated…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2018-11-28 Jason Dexter , Mitchell C. Begelman

Highly obscured active galactic nuclei (AGN) are common in nearby galaxies, but are difficult to observe beyond the local Universe, where they are expected to significantly contribute to the black hole accretion rate density. Furthermore,…

Changing-look active galactic nuclei (CLAGNs) are known to change their spectral type between 1 and 2 (changing-state) or change their absorption between Compton-thick and Compton-thin (changing-obscuration) on timescales of years or less.…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2025-01-17 Bing Lyu , Zhen Yan , Xue-bing Wu , Qingwen Wu , Wenfei Yu , Hao Liu

We present optical and X-ray data for a sample of serendipitous XMM-Newton sources that are selected to have 0.5-2 keV vs 2-4.5 keV X-ray hardness ratios which are harder than the X-ray background. The sources have 2-4.5 keV X-ray flux >=…

The extremes of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) variability offer valuable new insights into the drivers and physics of AGN. We discuss some of the most extreme cases of AGN variability; the highest amplitudes, deep minima states, extreme…

We investigate why half of X-ray--selected active galactic nuclei (AGN) in deep surveys lack signs of accretion in their optical spectra. The majority of these ``optically--dull'' AGN are no more than 6 times fainter than their host…

Astrophysics · Physics 2011-07-18 J. R. Rigby , G. H. Rieke , J. L. Donley , A. Alonso-Herrero , P. G. Pérez-González

We report on an optical (SDSS) and X-ray (XMM) study of an optically selected sample of four dual AGN systems at projected separations of 30--60~kpc. All sources are detected in the X-ray band (0.3-10 keV); seven objects are optically…

We present the analysis of four NuSTAR observations of the luminous infrared galaxy merger NGC 6240, hosting a close pair of highly obscured active galactic nuclei (AGN). Over a period of about two years, the source exhibits hard X-ray…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2017-08-23 Emanuele Nardini

The detection of new clusters of galaxies or the study of known clusters of galaxies in X-rays can be complicated by the presence of X-ray point sources, the majority of which will be active galactic nuclei (AGN). This can be addressed by…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2019-06-26 Ben J. Maughan , Thomas H. Reiprich

Changing-look active galactic nuclei (CL-AGNs) exhibit dramatic spectral variability on unexpectedly short timescales, challenging standard accretion flow models. Despite growing samples, the physical drivers of this extreme variability,…

We compiled a sample of 95 AGNs serendipitously detected in the 3-20 keV band at Galactic latitude |b|>10 during the RXTE slew survey (XSS, Revnivtsev et al.), and utilize it to study the statistical properties of the local population of…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-11-10 S. Sazonov , M. Revnivtsev