NICMOS Observations of Low-Redshift Quasar Host Galaxies

We have obtained Near-Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer images of 16 radio quiet quasars observed as part of a project to investigate the ``luminosity/host-mass limit.'' The limit results were presented in McLeod, Rieke, & Storrie-Lombardi (1999). In this paper, we present the images themselves, along with 1- and 2-dimensional analyses of the host galaxy properties. We find that our model-independent 1D technique is reliable for use on ground-based data at low redshifts; that many radio-quiet quasars live in deVaucouleurs-law hosts, although some of the techniques used to determine host type are questionable; that complex structure is found in many of the hosts, but that there are some hosts that are very smooth and symmetric; and that the nuclei radiate at ~2-20% of the Eddington rate based on the assumption that all galaxies have central black holes with a constant mass fraction of 0.6%. Despite targeting hard-to-resolve hosts, we have failed to find any that imply super-Eddington accretion rates.Comment: To appear in ApJ, 28 pages including degraded figures. Download the paper with full-resolutio figures from http://www.astro.wellesley.edu/kmcleod/mm.p

An Exploration of the Tully-Fisher Relation for Extreme Late-Type Spiral Galaxies

This paper explores the adherence of 47 extreme late-type galaxies to the B- and V-band Tully-Fisher relations defined by a sample of local calibrators. In both bands we find the mean luminosity at a given line width for extreme late-type spirals to lie below that predicted by standard Tully-Fisher relations. While many of the extreme late-type spirals do follow the Tully-Fisher relation to within our observational uncertainties, most of these galaxies lie below the normal, linear Tully-Fisher relation, and some are underluminous by more than 2 sigma (i.e. >1.16 magnitudes in V). This suggests a possible downward curvature of the Tully-Fisher relation for some of the smallest and faintest rotationally supported disk galaxies. This may be a consequence of the increasing prevalence of dark matter in these systems. We find the deviation from the Tully-Fisher relation to increase with decreasing luminosity and decreasing optical linear size in our sample, implying that the physically smallest and faintest spirals may be a structurally and kinematically distinct class of objects.Comment: 32 pages, 13 figures; to appear in the November A

Quasars and Ultraluminous Infrared Galaxies: At the Limit?

We have detected the host galaxies of 16 nearby, radio-quiet quasars using images obtained with the Near-Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS). We confirm that these luminous quasars tend to live in luminous, early-type host galaxies, and we use the host-galaxy magnitudes to refine the luminosity/host-mass limit inferred from ground-based studies. If quasars obey the relation $M_{black hole}/M_{spheroid}\sim0.006$ found for massive dark objects in nonactive galaxies, then our analysis implies that they radiate at up to $\sim20$ of the Eddington rate. An analogous analysis for ultraluminous infrared galaxies shows them to accrete at up to similar Eddington fractions, consistent with the hypothesis that some of them are powered by embedded quasars.Comment: 9 pages, includes 2 eps figs, accepted to ApJLet

The Extended Line Region of 3C 299

We present results of HST observations of the radio galaxy 3C 299. The broad-band F702W (R) and F555W (V) images (WFPC2/PC) show an elliptical galaxy, with a comet-like structure extending to the NE in the radio jet direction. The [OIII]$\lambda$5007 emission line map, shows a bi-conical structure centered on the nucleus, that overlaps the structure found in the broad-band filters. The radio core coincides with the center of the bi-conical structure and the radio axes are aligned with the direction of the cones. These data show clear evidence of a strong interaction between the radio jet and the NE morphology of the galaxy. We show evidence that this NE region is an ENLR; the line-ratio diagnostics show that models involving gas shocked by the radio-jet plus ionization from a precursor HII region, produced itself by the ionizing photons of the postshocked gas on the preshocked gas provide a good match to the observations. We investigate the spatial behavior of the ionizing parameter $U$, by determining the [OIII]/[OII] line ratio which is sensitive to the change of the ionization parameter, and trace its behavior over the ENLR along the radio jet direction. We find that [OIII]/[OII] does not follow a simple dilution model, but rather that it is approximately constant over a large range of distance from the nucleus thus requiring a local source of ionization which seems to be compatible with the shock models driven by the radio jet.Comment: 17 pages, 9 Postscript figures, ApJ accepted, uses aaspp.st

Type II Quasars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey: V. Imaging host galaxies with the Hubble Space Telescope

Type II quasars are luminous Active Galactic Nuclei whose centers are obscured by large amounts of gas and dust. In this paper we present 3-band HST images of nine type II quasars with redshifts 0.2 < z < 0.4 selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey based on their emission line properties. The intrinsic luminosities of these AGN are estimated to be -24 > M_B > -26, but optical obscuration allows their host galaxies to be studied unencumbered by bright nuclei. Each object has been imaged in three continuum filters (`UV', `blue' and `yellow') placed between the strong emission lines. The spectacular, high quality images reveal a wealth of details about the structure of the host galaxies and their environments. Six of the nine galaxies in the sample are ellipticals with de Vaucouleurs light profiles, one object has a well-defined disk component and the remaining two have marginal disks. Stellar populations of type II quasar hosts are more luminous (by a median of 0.3-0.7 mag, depending on the wavelength) and bluer (by about 0.4 mag) than are M* galaxies at the same redshift. When smooth fits to stellar light are subtracted from the images, we find both positive and negative residuals that become more prominent toward shorter wavelengths. We argue that the negative residuals are due to kpc-scale dust obscuration, while most positive residuals are due to the light from the nucleus scattered off interstellar material in the host galaxy. Scattered light makes a significant contribution to the broad band continuum emission and can be the dominant component of the extended emission in the UV in extreme cases.Comment: 51 pages, including 12 grey scale figures, 4 color figures, 5 tables. In press in AJ. Version with higher-resolution images available at http://www.astro.princeton.edu/~nadia/qso2.html. (Minor changes in response to the referee report

Further Discoveries of 12CO in Low Surface Brightness Galaxies

Using the IRAM 30m telescope we have obtained seven new, deep CO J(1-0) and J(2-1) observations of low surface brightness (LSB) galaxies. Five of the galaxies have no CO detected to extremely low limits (0.1-0.4 K km/s at J(1-0)), while two of the galaxies, UGC 01922 and UGC 12289, have clear detections in both line transitions. When these observations are combined with all previous CO observations taken of LSB systems, we compile a total of 34 observations, in which only 3 galaxies have had detections of their molecular gas. Comparing the LSB galaxies with and without CO detections to a sample of high surface brightness (HSB) galaxies with CO observations indicates that it is primarily the low density of baryonic matter within LSB galaxies which is causing their low CO fluxes. Finally, we note that one of the massive LSB galaxies studied in this project, UGC 06968 (a Malin-1 `cousin'), has upper limits placed on both M_H2 and M_H2/M_HI which are 10-20 times lower than the lowest values found for any galaxy (LSB or HSB) with similar global properties. This may be due to an extremely low temperature and metallicity within UGC 06968, or simply due to the CO distribution within the galaxy being too diffuse to be detected by the IRAM beam.Comment: 18 pages, 8 figures, 4 tables. Accepted by Ap

HI study of extremely metal-deficient dwarf galaxies. I. The Nancay Radio Telescope observations of twenty-two objects

The goal of this study is to measure parameters of the integrated HI emission for twenty-two dwarf galaxies with oxygen abundance 12+log(O/H) in the range of 7.42 to 7.65, which are representatives of the eXtremely Metal-Deficient (XMD) galaxy group. Some of them are expected to be similar to the well-known candidates for local young galaxies, IZw18 and SBS 0335-052 that have most of their baryon mass in the form of neutral gas. Therefore, the HI 21-cm line observations are crucial to understanding their group and individual properties. The Nancay Radio Telescope (NRT) with the upgraded focal receiver was used for observations of the 21-cm HI-line. This permitted the detection of the faintest sources with rms of ~1 mJy per 10.5 km/s resolution element. For eighteen detected galaxies we present the parameters of their integrated HI line emission and describe the data on individual objects in more detail. For four undetected XMD galaxies, we give upper limits on their M$(HI). For 70% of the twenty studied non low surface brightness XMD galaxies, we find evidence (both from HI and optical data) for their interaction with neighboring objects. In the brief discussion of the group HI properties of the observed subsample (the total O/H range is of 0.23 dex, or a factor of 1.7), we underline the broad distributions of the HI mass (range is of 2 orders of magnitude), of the ratio M(HI)/L_B (of 1 order of magnitude), and of the blue luminosity (range is of 2 orders of magnitude). We also obtained HI parameters of six galaxies that do not belong to the XMD sample. These data increase the number of XMD galaxies with known integrated HI parameters (or upper limits) by a factor of two. This allows us to address statistical properties of this group, which will be presented in a forthcoming paper. (Abridged).Comment: 11 pages, including 2 tables and 2 postscript figures. Accepted to Astronomy and Astrophysic

Aromatic Features in AGN: Star-Forming Infrared Luminosity Function of AGN Host Galaxies

We describe observations of aromatic features at 7.7 and 11.3 um in AGN of three types including PG, 2MASS and 3CR objects. The feature has been demonstrated to originate predominantly from star formation. Based on the aromatic-derived star forming luminosity, we find that the far-IR emission of AGN can be dominated by either star formation or nuclear emission; the average contribution from star formation is around 25% at 70 and 160 um. The star-forming infrared luminosity functions of the three types of AGN are flatter than that of field galaxies, implying nuclear activity and star formation tend to be enhanced together. The star-forming luminosity function is also a function of the strength of nuclear activity from normal galaxies to the bright quasars, with luminosity functions becoming flatter for more intense nuclear activity. Different types of AGN show different distributions in the level of star formation activity, with 2MASS> PG> 3CR star formation rates.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ, 24 pages, 13 figure

Spectroscopy of Low Surface Brightness Galaxies with the Hobby-Eberly Telescope

We have obtained low resolution spectra of nineteen red and blue low surface brightness galaxies, using the Marcario Low Resolution Spectrograph on the 9.2m Hobby-Eberly Telescope. These galaxies form a very heterogeneous class, whose spectra qualitatively resemble those of high surface brightness galaxies covering the full range of spectra seen in galaxies of Hubble types from E to Irr. We use a combination of emission line (EW(Halpha), NII/Halpha) and absorption line (Mgb, Hbeta, ) based diagnostics to investigate the star-formation and chemical enrichment histories of these galaxies. These are diverse, with some galaxies having low metallicity and very young mean stellar ages, and other galaxies showing old, super-solar metallicity stellar populations. In contrast with some previous studies which found a strong trend of decreasing metallicity with decreasing central surface brightness, we find a population of galaxies with low surface brightness and near-solar metallicity. Correlations between several of the gas phase and stellar population age and metallicity indicators are used to place contraints on plausible evolutionary scenarios for LSB galaxies. The redshift range spanned by these galaxies is broad, with radial velocities from 3400 km/s to more than 65000 km/s. A subset of the sample galaxies have published HI redshifts and gas masses based on observations with the Arecibo 305m single-dish radio telescope, which place these galaxies far off of the mean Tully-Fisher relation. Our new optical redshifts do not agree with the published HI redshifts for these galaxies. Most of the discrepancies can be explained by beam confusion in the Arecibo observations, causing erroneous HI detections for some of the galaxies.Comment: 31 pages, 12 figures, 7 tables. Uses emulateapj5.sty and onecolfloat5.sty, which are included. Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journa