Related papers: Dubious Deductions from AGN Survey Data
The results of spectropolarimetry surveys of obscured AGNs are reviewed, paying special attention to their implications for the existence of two populations of type 2 Seyfert galaxies -- hidden Seyfert 1s and "true" Seyfert 2s. In this…
Over the last few years, optical, mid-infrared and X-ray surveys have brought to light a significant number of candidate obscured AGN and, among them, many Type 2 quasars, the long-sought after "big cousins'' of local Seyfert 2 galaxies.…
The anisotropic nature of active galactic nuclei (AGN) is thought to be responsible for the observational differences between type-1 (pole-on) and type-2 (edge-on) nearby Seyfert-like galaxies. In this picture, the detection of emission…
In accordance with the AGN Unified Model, observed polarization can be related to the orientation of the line of sight with respect to the torus. AGN X-ray emission arises from the central region and carries the imprints of the obscuring…
Optical spectropolarimetry and broadband polarimetry in other wavebands has been a key to understanding many diverse aspects of AGN. In some cases polarization is due to synchrotron radiation, and in other cases it's due to scattering.…
The physical nature of the X-ray/radio correlation of AGN is still an unsolved question. High angular resolution observations are necessary to disentangle the associated energy dynamics into nuclear and stellar components. We present…
In this lecture note, we make the case for new (spectro)polarimetric measurements of "changing-look" AGNs (CLAGNs), a subclass of the AGN family tree that shows long-term (months to years) large flux variability associated with the…
We report on a spectro-polarimetric analysis of four southern Ultra-Luminous Infrared Galaxies (ULIRGs), aimed at constraining the presence of hidden broad AGN lines. For IRAS 19254--7245 ({\sl The Superantennae}) we find evidence for a…
Using the 3XMM catalogue of serendipitous X-ray sources, and the SDSS-DR9 spectroscopic catalogue, we have obtained a new sample of X-ray selected narrow emission line galaxies. The standard optical diagnostic diagram and selection by hard…
In order to derive statistical properties of a complete X-ray selected sample of AGN we used the classification spectra of the RASS Selected Areas-North survey to study the luminosities, redshifts, X-ray/visual flux ratios, line widths, and…
This review describes recent developments related to the unified model of active galactic nuclei (AGN). It focuses on new ideas about the origin and properties of the central obscurer (torus), and the connection with its surrounding. The…
Large optical surveys provide an unprecedented census of galaxies in the local Universe, forming an invaluable framework into which more detailed studies of objects can be placed. But how useful are optical surveys for understanding the…
The motivation of the "unified model" is to explain the main properties of the large zoo of active galactic nuclei with a single physical object. The discovery of broad permitted lines in the polarized spectrum of type 2 Seyfert galaxies in…
The infrared is a key wavelength regime for probing the dusty, obscured nuclear regions of active galaxies. We present results from an infrared study of 87 nearby Seyfert galaxies using the Spitzer Space Telescope and ground-based…
The model I recently proposed for the structure of quasars offers to unify the many aspects of Type 1 AGN: emission lines, absorption lines and reflection features. This makes the model heavily overconstrained by observation and readily…
The standard AGN unification models attempt to explain the diversity of observed AGN types by a few fundamental parameters, where orientation effects play a paramount role. Whether other factors, such as the evolutionary stage and the host…
The paradigm for AGN unification is reviewed, in terms of its optical manifestation as obscuration in the equatorial plane and its radio manifestation as relativistic beaming of the jet emission. Within this paradigm, observed AGN…
Some recent results on the physical and statistical properties of nearby and distant AGN are presented. I first discuss the properties of "elusive" AGNs, i.e. obscured AGNs which do not show a Seyfert-like spectrum in the optical. Then I…
It was once common to regard Seyfert and starburst galaxies as completely different types of object, but there is growing recognition that these classifications refer to the extremes of a continuous spectrum of galaxy types. In a previous…
Variability studies hold information on otherwise unresolvable regions in Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). Population studies of large samples likewise have been very productive for our understanding of AGN. These two themes are coming…