TY - JOUR
T1 - Double-Peaked Profiles
T2 - Ubiquitous Signatures of Disks in the Broad Emission Lines of Active Galactic Nuclei
AU - Storchi-Bergmann, T.
AU - Schimoia, J. S.
AU - Peterson, B. M.
AU - Elvis, M.
AU - Denney, K. D.
AU - Eracleous, M.
AU - Nemmen, R. S.
N1 - Funding Information:
T.S. B. acknowledges support from Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cientifico e Tecnologico (CNPq). B.M.P. is grateful for support by the NSF through grant AST-1008882 to The Ohio State University. K.D.D. is supported by an NSF AAPF fellowship awarded under NSF grant AST-1302093. R. N. acknowledges financial support from Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado de Sao Paulo (FAPESP).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.
PY - 2017/2/1
Y1 - 2017/2/1
N2 - Broad (∼10,000 km s-1), double-peaked emission-line profiles of Balmer lines emitted by active galactic nuclei (AGN) are thought to originate in the outer parts of an accretion disk surrounding a nuclear supermassive black hole (SMBH), at ∼1000 gravitational radii, and are most frequently observed in the nuclear spectra of low-luminosity AGN (LLAGN) and radio galaxies. In the present paper we argue that broad double-peaked profiles are present also in the spectra of other type 1 AGN, such as Seyfert 1 galaxies, suggesting that the inner part of the broad-line region (BLR) is also the outer part of the accretion disk. We use the Palomar spectral survey of nearby galaxies to show that the only difference between Seyfert 1 BLR line profiles and "bona fide" double-peakers is that, in most cases, besides a disk component, we need an additional Gaussian component attributed to nondisk clouds. The recognition that the inner and most variable part of the BLR has a disk geometry suggests that the factor f in the expression to obtain the SMBH mass in type 1 AGN, MBH = f (RBLRΔV2/G) , is f = 1 sin2 i , is for the disk-dominated sources. Our median i = 27° implies f = 4.5, very close to the most recent value of f = 4.3 ± 1.05, obtained from independent studies. We derive a relation between f and the FWHM of the broad profile that may help to reduce the uncertainties in the SMBH mass determinations of AGN.
AB - Broad (∼10,000 km s-1), double-peaked emission-line profiles of Balmer lines emitted by active galactic nuclei (AGN) are thought to originate in the outer parts of an accretion disk surrounding a nuclear supermassive black hole (SMBH), at ∼1000 gravitational radii, and are most frequently observed in the nuclear spectra of low-luminosity AGN (LLAGN) and radio galaxies. In the present paper we argue that broad double-peaked profiles are present also in the spectra of other type 1 AGN, such as Seyfert 1 galaxies, suggesting that the inner part of the broad-line region (BLR) is also the outer part of the accretion disk. We use the Palomar spectral survey of nearby galaxies to show that the only difference between Seyfert 1 BLR line profiles and "bona fide" double-peakers is that, in most cases, besides a disk component, we need an additional Gaussian component attributed to nondisk clouds. The recognition that the inner and most variable part of the BLR has a disk geometry suggests that the factor f in the expression to obtain the SMBH mass in type 1 AGN, MBH = f (RBLRΔV2/G) , is f = 1 sin2 i , is for the disk-dominated sources. Our median i = 27° implies f = 4.5, very close to the most recent value of f = 4.3 ± 1.05, obtained from independent studies. We derive a relation between f and the FWHM of the broad profile that may help to reduce the uncertainties in the SMBH mass determinations of AGN.
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U2 - 10.3847/1538-4357/835/2/236
DO - 10.3847/1538-4357/835/2/236
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85011976079
VL - 835
JO - Astrophysical Journal
JF - Astrophysical Journal
SN - 0004-637X
IS - 2
M1 - 236
ER -