Spectra of quasar narrow-line regions

DOI

In a single optical spectrum, the quasar narrow-line region (NLR) reveals low density, photoionized gas in the host galaxy interstellar medium, while the immediate vicinity of the central engine generates the accretion disk continuum and broad emission lines. To isolate these two components, we construct a library of high S/N optical composite spectra created from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-DR7). We divide the sample into bins of continuum luminosity and H{beta} FWHM that are used to construct median composites at different redshift steps up to 0.75. We measure the luminosities of the narrow-emission lines [NeV]{lambda}3427, [NeIII]{lambda}3870, [OIII]{lambda}5007, and [OII]{lambda}3728 with ionization potentials (IPs) of 97, 40, 35, and 13.6eV respectively. The high IP lines' luminosities show no evidence of increase with redshift consistent with no evolution in the AGN SED or the host galaxy ISM illuminated by the continuum. In contrast, we find that the [OII] line becomes stronger at higher redshifts, and we interpret this as a consequence of enhanced star formation contributing to the [OII] emission in host galaxies at higher redshifts. The SFRs estimated from the [OII] luminosities show a flatter increase with z than non-AGN galaxies given our assumed AGN contribution to the [OII] luminosity. Finally, we confirm an inverse correlation between the strength of the FeII{lambda}4570 complex and both the [OIII] EW (though not the luminosity) and the width of the H{beta} line as known from the eigenvector 1 correlations.

Associated data

Identifier
DOI http://doi.org/10.26093/cds/vizier.74483354
Source https://dc.g-vo.org/rr/q/lp/custom/CDS.VizieR/J/MNRAS/448/3354
Related Identifier https://cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/cat/J/MNRAS/448/3354
Related Identifier http://vizier.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/VizieR-2?-source=J/MNRAS/448/3354
Related Identifier https://cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/assocdata/?obs_collection=J/MNRAS/448/3354
Metadata Access http://dc.g-vo.org/rr/q/pmh/pubreg.xml?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=oai_b2find&identifier=ivo://CDS.VizieR/J/MNRAS/448/3354
Provenance
Creator Tammour A.; Gallagher S.C.; Richards G.
Publisher CDS
Publication Year 2015
Rights https://cds.unistra.fr/vizier-org/licences_vizier.html
OpenAccess true
Contact CDS support team <cds-question(at)unistra.fr>
Representation
Resource Type Dataset; AstroObjects
Discipline Astrophysics and Astronomy; Galactic and extragalactic Astronomy; High Energy Astrophysics; Interdisciplinary Astronomy; Natural Sciences; Observational Astronomy; Physics; Stellar Astronomy