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Related papers: Variability of Active Galactic Nuclei

200 papers

Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) are multiwavelength emitters. To have any hope of understanding them, or even to determine their energy output, we must observe them with many telescopes. I will review what we have learned from broad-band…

Astrophysics · Physics 2007-05-23 Belinda J. Wilkes

Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) are highly energetic astrophysical sources powered by accretion onto supermassive black holes in galaxies, which present unique observational signatures covering the full electromagnetic spectrum (and more) over…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2023-04-05 Stefano Bianchi , Vincenzo Mainieri , Paolo Padovani

We present results of recurrence analysis of 46 active galactic nuclei (AGN) using light curves from the 157-month catalog of the Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) in the 14-150 keV band. We generate recurrence plots and compute recurrence…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2022-11-28 R. A. Phillipson , M. S. Vogeley , P. T. Boyd

Variability of radio-emitting active galactic nuclei can be used to probe both intrinsic variations arising from shocks, flares, and other changes in emission from regions surrounding the central supermassive black hole, as well as…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2015-01-21 Hayley Bignall , Steve Croft , Talvikki Hovatta , Jun Yi Koay , Joseph Lazio , Jean-Pierre Macquart , Cormac Reynolds

Reverberation-mapping campaigns have revolutionized our understanding of AGN. They have allowed the direct determination of the broad-line region size, enabled mapping of the gas distribution around the central black hole, and are starting…

Astrophysics · Physics 2016-01-27 Hagai Netzer , Bradley M. Peterson

There are several key open questions as to the nature and origin of AGN including: 1) what initiates the active phase, 2) the duration of the active phase, and 3) the effect of the AGN on the host galaxy. Critical new insights to these can…

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics · Physics 2009-04-27 Steve Kraemer , Rogier Windhorst , Kenneth G. Carpenter , Mike Crenshaw , Martin Elvis , Margarita Karovska

In this study, we demonstrate some of the caveats in common statistical methods used for analysing astronomical variability timescales. We consider these issues specifically in the context of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and use a more…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2024-12-12 Sofia Kankkunen , Merja Tornikoski , Talvikki Hovatta

Interband lags in the optical continua of active galactic nuclei (AGN) have been observed over years of monitoring, yet their physical origins remain unclear. While variable interband lags have been found in a few individual AGN…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2025-07-08 Zhen-Bo Su , Zhen-Yi Cai , Hengxiao Guo , Mouyuan Sun , Jun-Xian Wang

Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) exhibit complex variability across multiple wavelengths, reflecting diverse physical processes near their central engines. This work investigates the temporal variability of four AGNs Mrk~509, NGC~5548,…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2026-05-12 R. A. A. Souza , E. Hatziminaoglou , A. de Pádua Santos , T. Stosic

The variability of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) is ubiquitous but has not yet been understood. Measuring the optical variation properties of AGNs, such as variation timescale and amplitude, and then correlating them with their fundamental…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2024-01-11 Xu-Fan Hu , Zhen-Yi Cai , Jun-Xian Wang

This article focuses on certain variability and emission characteristics of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN), especially their radio-loud subset consisting of quasars, BL Lacs and $\gamma$-ray detected narrow-line Seyfert 1 galaxies, all of…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2019-06-28 Gopal-Krishna , Silke Britzen , Paul Wiita

Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) are known to show flux variability over all observable timescales and across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. Over the past decade, a growing number of sources have been observed to show dramatic flux and…

Astrophysics of Galaxies · Physics 2022-11-11 Claudio Ricci , Benny Trakhtenbrot

The inter-band lags among the optical broad-band continua of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) have been intensively explored over the past decade. However, the nature of the lags remains under debate. Here utilizing two distinct scenarios for…

Recent works, both theoretical and observational, have suggested that turbulence could play a non-negligible role in the broadening of emission lines in active galactic nuclei. The purpose of this note is to show how shock wave-turbulence…

Astrophysics · Physics 2009-10-31 Luigi Foschini

In this paper we give a brief review of the astrophysics of active galactic nuclei (AGN). After a general introduction motivating the study of AGNs, we discuss our present understanding of the inner workings of the central engines, most…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2013-01-18 Henric Krawczynski , Ezequiel Treister

Active galactic nuclei (AGN) are one of the most luminous objects in the Universe, emitting powerful continuum and line emission across all wavelength bands. They represent an important link in the investigations of the galaxy evolution and…

Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) are energetic astrophysical sources powered by accretion onto supermassive black holes in galaxies, and present unique observational signatures that cover the full electromagnetic spectrum over more than twenty…

Under the unified model for active galactic nuclei (AGNs), narrow-line (Type 2) AGNs are, in fact, broad-line (Type 1) AGNs but each with a heavily obscured accretion disk. We would therefore expect the optical continuum emission from Type…

We are conducting an archival Swift program to measure multiwavelength variability in active galactic nuclei (AGN). This variability information will provide constraints on the geometry, physical conditions and processes of the structures…

High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena · Physics 2015-05-21 Jonathan Gelbord , Caryl Gronwall , Dirk Grupe , Dan Vanden Berk , Jian Wu

There is increasing evidence to suggest that AGN activity may be episodic, with a wide range of possible time scales. Radio galaxies exhibit the most striking examples of episodic activity, with two or three distinct pairs of lobes on…

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics · Physics 2015-03-19 D. J. Saikia , M. Jamrozy , C. Konar , S. Nandi