Related papers: What's wrong with AGN models for the X-ray backgro…
This talk discusses the unified X-ray/UV absorption models in AGN. I will first review the models and discuss how they offer an unique opportunity to probe the near nuclear environment of AGNs. Recently, however, the validity of these…
The X-ray sky is not as well known as is sometimes thought. We report on our search of minority populations (Kim & Elvis 1999). One of the most intriguing is that of `blank field sources', i.e. bright ROSAT sources (F(X)>1e-13 erg/cm2/s)…
We study the spectral properties of the unresolved cosmic X-ray background (CXRB) in the 1.5-7.0 keV energy band with the aim of providing an observational constraint on the statistical properties of those sources that are too faint to be…
I present an overview of observational studies of quasars of all types, with particular emphasis on X-ray observational studies. The presentation is based on the most popularly accepted unified picture of quasars - collectively referred to…
First indications of the warm/hot intergalactic medium, tracing out the large scale structure of the universe, have been obtained in sensitive Chandra and XMM-Newton high resolution absorption line spectroscopy of bright blazars. High…
Most of the energy of the X-ray background is contributed by sources with a hard X-ray spectrum, harder than the spectrum observed in nearby type 1 AGNs. The hard background contributors are conventionally identified with type 2 AGNs,…
Our goal is to probe the populations of obscured and unobscured AGN investigating their optical-IR and X-ray properties as a function of X-ray flux, luminosity and redshift within a hard X-ray selected sample of 136 X-ray sources in the XMM…
Recent ROSAT studies have identified a significant population of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) that are notably faint in soft X-rays relative to their optical fluxes. Are these AGN intrinsically X-ray weak or are they just highly absorbed?…
We present an analysis of the X-ray properties of sources detected in the 13H XMM-Newton deep (200ks) field. In order to constrain the absorbed AGN population, we use extensive Monte Carlo simulations to directly compare the X-ray colours…
The cosmic X-ray background (XRB) spectrum and active galaxy number counts encode essential information about the spectral evolution of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and have been successfully modeled by XRB synthesis models for many years.…
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 >=…
Obscured active galactic nuclei, which are classified optically as type 2 (narrow-line) Seyfert galaxies in the local universe, are by far the most promising candidates for the origin of the hard (2-10 keV) X-ray background radiation.…
Population synthesis models of actively accreting super-massive black holes (or active galactic nuclei -- AGN) predict a large fraction that must grow behind dense, obscuring screens of gas and dust. Deep X-ray surveys are thought to have…
XMM-Newton spectra of five red, 2MASS AGN, selected from a sample observed by Chandra to be relatively X-ray bright and to cover a range of hardness ratios, confirm the presence of substantial absorbing material in three sources with…
X-ray transience is the most extreme form of variability observed in AGN or normal non-active galaxies. While factors of 2-3 on timescales of days to years are quite common among AGN, X-ray transients appear only once and vanish from the…
The cores of active galactic nuclei (AGN) harbor some of the most extreme conditions of matter and energy in the Universe. One of the major goals of high-energy astrophysics is to probe these extreme environments in the vicinity of…
We present results of a high-resolution soft X-ray (0.2-2 keV) spectroscopic study of a sample of 69 nearby obscured Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) observed with the Reflection Grating Spectrometer (RGS) on board XMM-Newton. This is the…
The SWIFT gamma ray observatory's Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) has detected a sample of active galactic nuclei (AGN) based solely on their hard X-ray flux (14-195 keV). In this paper, we present for the first time {\it XMM-Newton} X-ray…
We discuss the origin of the soft X-ray excess seen in AGN. There are clear advantages to models where this arises from atomic processes in partially ionised material rather than where it is a true continuum component. However, current data…
We present new measurements of the evolution of the X-ray luminosity functions (XLFs) of unabsorbed and absorbed Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) out to z~5. We construct samples containing 2957 sources detected at hard (2-7 keV) X-ray…