2014MNRAS.439.3847R -
Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 439, 3847-3859 (2014/April-3)
Investigating the sensitivity of observed spectral energy distributions to clumpy torus properties in Seyfert galaxies.
RAMOS ALMEIDA C., ALONSO-HERRERO A., LEVENSON N.A., ASENSIO RAMOS A., RODRIGUEZ ESPINOSA J.M., GONZALEZ-MARTIN O., PACKHAM C. and MARTINEZ M.
Abstract (from CDS):
We present nuclear spectral energy distributions (SEDs) from 1 to 18µm of a small sample of nearby, nearly face-on and undisturbed Seyfert galaxies without prominent nuclear dust lanes. These nuclear SEDs probe the central ∼ 35 pc of the galaxies, on average, and include photometric and spectroscopic infrared (IR) data. We use these SEDs, the clumpy torus models of Nenkova et al. and a Bayesian approach to study the sensitivity of different IR wavelengths to the torus parameters. We find that high angular resolution 8-13µm spectroscopy alone reliably constrains the number of clumps and their optical depth (N0 and τV). On the other hand, we need a combination of mid- and near-IR subarcsecond resolution photometry to constrain torus width and inclination, as well as the radial distribution of the clouds (σ, i and q). For flat radial profiles (q = 0, 1), it is possible to constrain the extent of the mid-IR-emitting dust within the torus (Y) when N-band spectroscopy is available, in addition to near-IR photometry. Finally, by fitting different combinations of average and individual Seyfert 1 and Seyfert 2 data, we find that, in general, for undisturbed, nearly face-on Seyferts without prominent nuclear dust lanes, the minimum combination of data necessary to reliably constrain all the torus parameters is J+K+M-band photometry + N-band spectroscopy.
Abstract Copyright:
© 2014 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society (2014)
Journal keyword(s):
instrumentation: high angular resolution - galaxies: active - galaxies: nuclei - galaxies: Seyfert - infrared: galaxies
Simbad objects:
7
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