The Discovery of Extended Thermal X-ray Emission from PKS 2152-699: Evidence for a `Jet-cloud' Interaction

A Chandra ACIS-S observation of PKS 2152-699 reveals thermal emission from a diffuse region around the core and a hotspot located 10" northeast from the core. This is the first detection of thermal X-ray radiation on kiloparsec scales from an extragalactic radio source. Two other hotspots located 47" north-northeast and 26" southwest from the core were also detected. Using a Raymond-Smith model, the first hotspot can be characterized with a thermal plasma temperature of 2.6$\times10^6$ K and an electron number density of 0.17 cm$^{-3}$. These values correspond to a cooling time of about 1.6$\times10^7$ yr. In addition, an emission line from the hotspot, possibly Fe xxv, was detected at rest wavelength 10.04\AA. The thermal X-ray emission from the first hotspot is offset from the radio emission but is coincident with optical filaments detected with broadband filters of HST/WFPC2. The best explanation for the X-ray, radio, and optical emission is that of a `jet-cloud' interaction. The diffuse emission around the nucleus of PKS 2152-699 can be modeled as a thermal plasma with a temperature of 1.2$\times10^7$ K and a luminosity of 1.8$\times10^{41}$ erg s$^{-1}$. This emission appears to be asymmetric with a small extension toward Hotspot A, similar to a jet. An optical hotspot (EELR) is seen less than an arcsecond away from this extension in the direction of the core. This indicates that the extension may be caused by the jet interacting with an inner ISM cloud, but entrainment of hot gas is unavoidable. Future observations are discussed.Comment: To appear in the Astrophysical Journal 21 pages, 5 Postscript figures, 1 table, AASTeX v. 5.

BeppoSAX Observations of 2 Jy Lobe-dominated Broad-Line Sources: the Discovery of a Hard X-ray Component

We present new BeppoSAX LECS, MECS, and PDS observations of five lobe-dominated, broad-line active galactic nuclei selected from the 2 Jy sample of southern radio sources. These include three radio quasars and two broad-line radio galaxies. ROSAT PSPC data, available for all the objects, are also used to better constrain the spectral shape in the soft X-ray band. The collected data cover the 0.1 - 10 keV energy range, reaching 40 keV for one source. Detailed spectral fitting shows that all sources have a flat hard X-ray spectrum with energy index alpha_x ~ 0.75 in the 2 - 10 keV energy range. This is a new result, which is at variance with the situation at lower energies where these sources exhibit steeper spectra. Spectral breaks ~0.5 at 1 - 2 keV characterize the overall X-ray spectra of our objects. The flat, high-energy slope is very similar to that displayed by flat-spectrum/core-dominated quasars, which suggests that the same emission mechanism (most likely inverse Compton) produces the hard X-ray spectra in both classes. Contrary to the optical evidence for some of our sources, no absorption above the Galactic value is found in our sample. Finally, a (weak) thermal component is also present at low energies in the two broad-line radio galaxies included in our study.Comment: 4 pages, LateX, 3 figures. Uses espcrc2.sty. To appear in: "The Active X-ray Sky: Results from BeppoSAX and Rossi-XTE", Rome, Italy, 21-24 October, 1997, Eds.: L. Scarsi, H. Bradt, P. Giommi and F. Fior

Spectroscopy of the near-nuclear regions of Cygnus A: estimating the mass of the supermassive black hole

We use a combination of high spatial resolution optical and near-IR spectroscopic data to make a detailed study of the kinematics of the NLR gas in the near-nuclear regions of the powerful, FRII radio galaxy Cygnus A (z=0.0560), with the overall goal of placing limits on the mass of any supermassive black hole in the core. Our K-band infrared observations (0.75 arcsec seeing) -- taken with NIRSPEC on the Keck II telescope -- show a smooth rotation pattern across the nucleus in the Paschen alpha and H_2 emission lines along a slit position (PA180) close to perpendicular to the radio axis, however, there is no evidence for such rotation along the radio axis (PA105). Higher spatial resolution observations of the [OIII]5007 emission line -- taken with STIS on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) -- confirm the general rotation pattern of the gas in the direction perpendicular to the radio axis, and provide evidence for steep velocity gradients within a radius of 0.1 arcsec of the core. The circular velocities measured from both the Keck and HST data lead to an estimate of the mass of the supermassive black hole of 2.5+/-0.7x10^9 solar masses. For the host galaxy properties of Cygnus A, this mass is consistent with the global correlations between black hole mass and host galaxy properties deduced for non-active galaxies. Therefore, despite the extreme power of its radio source and the quasar-like luminosity of its AGN, the black hole in Cygnus A is not unusually massive considering theluminosity of its host galaxy. Indeed, the estimated mass of the black hole in Cygnus A is similar to that inferred for the supermassive black hole in the FRI radio galaxy M87, despite the fact that the AGN and radio jets of Cygnus A are 2 -- 3 orders of magnitude more powerful.Comment: 17 pages, 12 figure

The origin of the infrared emission in radio galaxies. III. Analysis of 3CRR objects

We present Spitzer photometric data for a complete sample of 19 low redshift (z<0.1) 3CRR radio galaxies as part of our efforts to understand the origin of the prodigious mid- to far-infrared (MFIR) emission from radio-loud AGN. Our results show a correlation between AGN power (indicated by [OIII] 5007 emission line luminosity) and 24 micron luminosity. This result is consistent with the 24 micron thermal emission originating from warm dust heated directly by AGN illumination. Applying the same correlation test for 70 micron luminosity against [OIII] luminosity we find this relation to suffer from increased scatter compared to that of 24 micron. In line with our results for the higher-radio-frequency-selected 2Jy sample, we are able to show that much of this increased scatter is due to heating by starbursts which boost the far-infrared emission at 70 micron in a minority of objects (17-35%). Overall this study supports previous work indicating AGN illumination as the dominant heating mechanism for MFIR emitting dust in the majority of low to intermediate redshift radio galaxies (0.03<z<0.7), with the advantage of strong statistical evidence. However, we find evidence that the low redshift broad-line objects (z<0.1) are distinct in terms of their positions on the MFIR vs. [OIII] correlations.Comment: 31 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication to Ap

Jet-Induced Emission-Line Nebulosity and Star Formation in the High-Redshift Radio Galaxy 4C41.17

The high redshift radio galaxy 4C41.17 consists of a powerful radio source in which previous work has shown that there is strong evidence for jet-induced star formation along the radio axis. We argue that nuclear photoionization is not responsible for the excitation of the emission line clouds and we construct a jet-cloud interaction model to explain the major features revealed by the data. The interaction of a high-powered jet with a dense cloud in the halo of 4C41.17 produces shock-excited emission-line nebulosity through ~1000 km/s shocks and induces star formation. The CIII to CIV line ratio and the CIV luminosity emanating from the shock, imply that the pre-shock density in the line-emitting cloud is high enough (~1-10 cm^-3) that shock initiated star formation could proceed on a timescale of order a few x 10^6 yrs, well within the estimated dynamical age of the radio source. Broad (FWHM ~ 100 - 1400 km/s) emission lines are attributed to the disturbance of the gas cloud by a partial bow--shock and narrow emission lines (FWHM ~ 500 - 650 km/s) (in particular CIV) arise in precursor emission in relatively low metallicity gas. The implied baryonic mass ~ 8 \times 10^{10} solar masses of the cloud is high and implies that Milky Way size condensations existed in the environments of forming radio galaxies at a redshift of 3.8. Our interpretation of the data provides a physical basis for the alignment of the radio, emission-line and UV continuum images in some of the highest redshift radio galaxies and the analysis presented here may form a basis for the calculation of densities and cloud masses in other high redshift radio galaxies.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figures; uses astrobib.sty and aaspp4.sty. Better versions of figures available via anonymous from ftp://mso.anu.edu.au:pub/pub/geoff/4C41.1

The location of the broad HI absorption in 3C305: clear evidence for a jet-accelerated neutral outflow

We present high-spatial resolution 21-cm HI VLA observations of the radio galaxy 3C305 (z=0.041). These new high-resolution data show that the ~1000 km/s broad HI absorption, earlier detected in low-resolution WSRT observations, is occurring against the bright, eastern radio lobe, about 1.6 kpc from the nucleus. We use new optical spectra taken with the WHT to make a detailed comparison of the kinematics of the neutral hydrogen with that of the ionised gas. The striking similarity between the complex kinematics of the two gas phases suggests that both the ionised gas and the neutral gas are part of the same outflow. Earlier studies of the ionised gas had already found evidence for a strong interaction between the radio jet and the interstellar medium at the location of the eastern radio lobe. Our results show that the fast outflow produced by this interaction also contains a component of neutral atomic hydrogen. The most likely interpretation is that the radio jet ionises the ISM and accelerates it to the high outflow velocities observed. Our observations demonstrate that, following this strong jet-cloud interaction, not all gas clouds are destroyed and that part of the gas can cool and become neutral. The mass outflow rate measured in 3C~305 is comparable, although at the lower end of the distribution, to that found in Ultra-Luminous IR galaxies. This suggests that AGN-driven outflows, and in particular jet-driven outflows, can have a similar impact on the evolution of a galaxy as starburst-driven superwinds.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A. 7 pages, 4 figure