Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Jan 2011
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2011aas...21710602h&link_type=abstract
American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #217, #106.02; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 43, 2011
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
Scientific paper
X-shaped radio galaxies (XRGs) are unusual radio galaxies with a second pair of inactive lobes in addition to the canonical double-lobed source. The origin of the inactive lobes is not understood, and two dramatically different hypotheses have been proposed: either they are the result of a rapid reorientation of the AGN jet axis (possibly due to a supermassive black hole merger---XRGs have been held up as a predictor of merger rates) or they are produced by the deflection of relativistic lobe plasma flowing back (backflow) from the "hot spot" terminal shocks in the active lobes. These hypotheses have been explored by radio and optical observations, but the backflow hypothesis relies on the hot ISM or intragroup/intracluster medium to shape the radio source. In this work, we have studied the effect of the hot medium with Chandra and 3D hydrodynamic modeling of extragalactic radio sources. We present these results and argue that while the properties of the hot gas atmospheres are important, the backflow hypothesis needs to be modified before it can successfully explain XRG morphology. We also demonstrate that X-ray observations can be used to constrain the rapid reorientation model using one particular XRG. This research was funded in part by Chandra grants GO89109X, GO90111X, and GO011138A.
Hodges-Kluck Edmund J.
Reynolds Chris S.
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