Signatures of Kiloparsec-scale Black Hole Pairs

Details Signatures of Kiloparsec-scale Black Hole Pairs Signatures of Kiloparsec-scale Black Hole Pairs

Jan 2012

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2012aas...21930805b&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #219, #308.05

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

Supermassive black hole (SMBH) pairs are expected to form in major galaxy mergers, but until recently only a few such pairs were known. Recent spectroscopic surveys have greatly increased the number of candidate dual SMBHs via identification of double-peaked narrow-line (NL) AGN. Despite this remarkable progress, the population of SMBH pairs, and particularly their relationship to double-peaked NL AGN, is not well-constrained. To this end, we model SMBH evolution in galaxy mergers using N-body/smoothed-particle-hydrodynamics simulations, focusing on NL activity in kiloparsec-scale SMBH pairs. Previous galaxy merger simulations have not considered the NL region, and photoionization models have not considered the rapidly-varying environment of merging galaxies. We make a first attempt to model the NL region in galaxy merger simulations using a semi-analytic model. We find that kiloparsec-scale double-peaked NL AGN are a fairly generic but often short-lived phase of gaseous major mergers, lasting from less than a Myr to tens of Myr. The double-peaked features originate from a combination of SMBH motion and gas kinematics; only a minority arise from comparable-luminosity NL regions orbiting on kpc scales. NL AGN are most active in nearly equal-mass, gas-rich mergers, though we note that dust obscuration should be more important in these cases. Furthermore, NL AGN activity typically peaks during the final stage of galaxy merging, which coincides with the kpc-scale phase as well as the phase following the BH merger. We discuss the implications of our findings for efforts to confirm AGN pair candidates via follow-up observations.

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