English

Observational hints on the torus obscuring gas behaviour through X-rays with NuSTAR data

Astrophysics of Galaxies 2022-02-02 v1 High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena

Abstract

According to theory, the torus of active galactic nuclei (AGN) is sustained from a wind coming off the accretion disk, and for low efficient AGN, it has been proposed that such structure disappears. However, the exact conditions for its disappearance remain unclear. This can be studied throughout the reflection component at X-rays, which is associated with distant and neutral material at the inner walls of the torus in obscured AGN. We select a sample of 81 AGNs observed with NuSTAR with a distance limit of D< 200\,Mpc and Eddington rate λEddLbol/LEdd<103\rm{\lambda_{Edd} \equiv L_{bol}/L_{Edd}<10^{-3}}. We fit the 3-70\,keV spectra using a model accounting for a partial-covering absorber plus a reflection component from neutral material. We find that the existence of the reflection component spans in a wide range of black-hole mass and bolometric luminosities, with only \sim13\% of our sample (11 sources) lacking of any reflection signatures. These sources fall in the region in which the torus may be lacking in the L-MBH diagram. For the sources with a detected reflection component, we find that the vast majority of them are highly obscured (log NH>23\rm{\log \ N_H > 23}), with 20%\rm{\sim 20\%} being Compton-thick. We also find an increase on the number of unobscured sources and a tentative increase on the ratio between FeKα\rm{FeK\alpha} emission line and Compton-hump luminosities toward λEdd=105\rm{\lambda_{Edd}=10^{-5}}, suggesting that the contribution of the FeKα\rm{FeK\alpha} line changes with Eddington ratio.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2201.01767,
  title  = {Observational hints on the torus obscuring gas behaviour through X-rays with NuSTAR data},
  author = {Natalia Osorio-Clavijo and Omaira González-Martín and Sebastián F. Sánchez-Sánchez and Donaji Esparza-Arredondo and Josefa Masegosa and César Victoria-Ceballos and Lorena Hernández-García and Yaherlyn Díaz},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2201.01767},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

17 pages, 12 figures, 5 tables. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

R2 v1 2026-06-24T08:41:13.322Z