Black hole Growth in the Early Universe

该项目将专注于确定早期宇宙中的活动星系核，研究它们所在星系的性质，并开发模型来描述星系及其中心黑洞的共同演化，这些模型可以延伸到最早的宇宙时代。我们将利用一些最先进的光谱测量，包括MOSDEF测量(10米Keck望远镜的一个主要的49个晚上的计划)，一个已完成的专注于AGN早期的9个晚上的Keck计划(与加州大学圣地亚哥分校合作进行)，以及3DHST测量(与哈勃太空望远镜进行)。我们将使用这些测量来识别活动星系核并确定它们的性质(如它们的光度、黑洞积聚率和它们的遮挡程度)，并将这些测量与其他多波长诊断(包括X射线和红外技术)进行比较。然后，我们将研究活动星系核的性质如何依赖于它们所在的星系的类型，为早期星系群中促进和调节黑洞增长的过程提供新的见解。最后，这些结果将被用来开发一个关于活动星系核及其宿主星系的模型，该模型可以外推到非常早期的宇宙时间，以预测未来的飞行任务和天文台--特别是侧重于雅典娜天文台，这是欧洲航天局正在开发的下一个大型X射线任务，由莱斯特大学发挥主导作用。

This project will focus on identifying AGN in the early Universe, studying the properties of the galaxies they lie in, and developing models to describe the co-evolution of galaxies and their central black holes that can be extended to the very earliest cosmic times. We will take advantage of a number of state-of-the-art spectroscopic surveys - including the MOSDEF survey (a major 49-night programme with the 10m Keck telescope), a completed 9-night Keck programme that focused on early AGN (carried out in collaboration with the University of California-San Diego), and the 3DHST survey (carried out with the Hubble Space Telescope).We will use these surveys to identify AGN and determine their properties (such as their luminosities, black hole accretion rates, and their level of obscuration) and compare these measurements with other multiwavelength diagnostics (including X-ray and infrared techniques). We will then study how the properties of the AGN depend on the types of galaxies they are found in, providing new insights into the processes fuelling and regulating black hole growth in the early galaxy population. Finally, these results will be used to develop a model relating AGN and their host galaxies that can be extrapolated out to very early cosmic times to make predictions for future missions and observatories - in particular focusing on the Athena observatory, the next large X-ray mission under-development by the European Space Agency with a leading role by the University of Leicester.