Other
Scientific paper
Feb 1997
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1997natur.385..700h&link_type=abstract
Nature, Volume 385, Issue 6618, pp. 700-702 (1997).
Other
129
Scientific paper
Active galaxies are thought to be powered by the accretion of gas onto a central massive black hole. Seyfert galaxies-the most common examples of nearby active galaxies-are separated into two classes based on their emission line widths1. Seyfert 1 galaxies exhibit broad emission lines that are attributed to ionized gas within 1 pc of the black hole, whereas the spectra of Seyfert 2 galaxies show only narrower emission lines, believed to originate from a much larger region around the core. The 'unified model' for Seyfert galaxies attributes these differences to the presence of a dusty torus of dense molecular gas surrounding the black hole2: the orientation of Seyfert 2 galaxies is such that the broad-line region is obscured. The detection3 in the polarization spectrum of broad emission lines scattered into our line of sight by free electrons in NGC1068 (the prototypical Seyfert 2 galaxy) and other Seyfert 2 galaxies4-8 has strengthened this view, but all of these galaxies were subject to selection biases. Here we report the results of a systematic search for polarized broad emission lines in a well defined sample of Seyfert 2 galaxies. We show that the ability to detect scattered broad emission lines is related to the far-infrared colours, in the manner predicted by the unified model.
Bailey Jeremy A.
Heisler Charlene Anne
Lumsden Stuart L.
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