The Impact of Observed Quasar Outflows on Cosmological Structure Formation

观测到的类星体流出对宇宙结构形成的影响

• 批准号: 0837880
• 负责人: Nahum Arav
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2008-01-01 至 2011-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0837880&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Impact; Observed; Quasar; Outflows; Cosmological

AST-0507772AravQuasar outflows impact the evolution of super-massive black holes, their host galaxies, the surrounding inter-galactic medium, and cluster cooling flows. This project will analyze high-resolution spectroscopic data to measure the kinetic luminosity and chemical abundances of observed quasar winds, which are the most crucial input to these theoretical ideas. This involves three phases: 1) identifying and observing targets that contain diagnostics for the total outflowing column density and for the distance of the outflow from the central source, quantities which are currently highly uncertain; 2) measuring reliable column densities, often severely underestimated, using a new approach of global fitting to the observed outflow troughs; 3) using these column densities in velocity-dependent photoionization model grids, giving much improved densities, flow distances, abundances, and thus kinetic luminosities.Interdisciplinary undergraduate research opportunities exist in the project's need for data mining of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey quasar database. Animation movies of winds from active galactic nuclei, created from the research, will be used in planetarium shows for the general public, along with other audio-visual tools.

AST-0507772AravQuasar外流影响了超大质量黑洞、它们的宿主星系、周围的星系间介质和星系团冷却流动的演化。该项目将分析高分辨率光谱数据，以测量观测到的类星体风的动力学光度和化学丰度，这是这些理论想法最关键的输入。这涉及三个阶段：1)确定和观察包含对总的流出柱密度和流出到中心源的距离的诊断的目标，这些量目前是高度不确定的；2)使用对观测到的流出槽进行全局拟合的新方法，测量可靠的柱密度，通常被严重低估；3)在依赖速度的光电离模型网格中使用这些柱密度，给出更多的密度、流距离、丰度和动力学发光。该项目需要斯隆数字天空勘测类星体数据库的数据挖掘，存在跨学科的本科生研究机会。根据这项研究创作的活动星系核风的动画电影将与其他视听工具一起用于面向公众的天文馆展览。