Journal article
The landscape of galaxies harboring changing-look active galactic nuclei in the local universe
SA Dodd, JAP Law-Smith, K Auchettl, E Ramirez-Ruiz, RJ Foley
Astrophysical Journal Letters | IOP Publishing Ltd | Published : 2021
Abstract
We study the properties of the host galaxies of changing-look active galactic nuclei (CL AGNs) with the aim of understanding the conditions responsible for triggering CL activity. We find that CL AGN hosts primarily reside in the so-called green valley that is located between spiral-like star-forming galaxies and dead ellipticals, implying that CL AGNs are activated during distinct periods of quenching and galaxy transformation processes. CL AGN hosts have low galaxy asymmetry indicators, suggesting that secular evolutionary processes (the influence of bars and spirals, and possibly minor mergers) might be the primary mechanism for transporting gas to the vicinity of the supermassive black h..
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Grants
Awarded by National Science Foundation
Funding Acknowledgements
We thank V. Baldassare, K. Bundy, J. Dai, D. French, B. Mockler, S., V. Pandya, S. Raimundo, M. Vestergaard, and M. Gaskell for useful discussions. We would also like to thank the referee for constructive comments that substantially helped improve the quality of the paper. We are indebted to S. Ellison for sharing with us so many key notions of quenching and galaxy transformation in the contemporary universe. S.D, E.R.-R. and J.L.-S. are supported by the Heising-Simons Foundation, the Danish National Research Foundation (DNRF132), and NSF (AST-1615881, AST-1911206, and AST-1852393). Parts of this research were supported by the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions (ASTRO 3D), through project number CE170100013.