Steps Toward Unveiling the True Population of AGN: Photometric Selection of Broad-Line AGN

Details Steps Toward Unveiling the True Population of AGN: Photometric Selection of Broad-Line AGN Steps Toward Unveiling the True Population of AGN: Photometric Selection of Broad-Line AGN

Jan 2012

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2012aas...21943517s&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #219, #435.17

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

We present an AGN selection technique that enables identification of broad-line AGN using only photometric data. An extension of infrared selection techniques, our method involves fitting a given spectral energy distribution with a model consisting of three physically motivated components: infrared power law emission, optical accretion disk emission, and host galaxy emission. Each component can be varied in intensity, and a reduced chi-square minimization routine is used to determine the optimum parameters for each object. Using this model, both broad- and narrow-line AGN are seen to fall within discrete ranges of parameter space that have plausible bounds, allowing physical trends with luminosity and redshift to be determined. Based on a fiducial sample of AGN from the catalog of Trump et al. (2009), we find the region occupied by broad-line AGN to be distinct from that of quiescent or star-bursting galaxies. Because this technique relies only on photometry, it will allow us to find AGN at fainter magnitudes than are accessible in spectroscopic surveys, and thus probe a population of less luminous and/or higher redshift objects. With the vast availability of photometric data in large surveys, this technique should have broad applicability and result in large samples that will complement X-ray AGN catalogs.

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