The Astrophysical Journal (Jan 2023)
Shedding New Light on Weak Emission-line Quasars in the C iv–Hβ Parameter Space
- Trung Ha,
- Cooper Dix,
- Brandon M. Matthews,
- Ohad Shemmer,
- Michael S. Brotherton,
- Adam D. Myers,
- Gordon T. Richards,
- Jaya Maithil,
- Scott F. Anderson,
- W. N. Brandt,
- Aleksandar M. Diamond-Stanic,
- Xiaohui Fan,
- S. C. Gallagher,
- Richard Green,
- Paulina Lira,
- Bin Luo,
- Hagai Netzer,
- Richard M. Plotkin,
- Jessie C. Runnoe,
- Donald P. Schneider,
- Michael A. Strauss,
- Benny Trakhtenbrot,
- Jianfeng Wu
Affiliations
- Trung Ha
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of North Texas , Denton, TX 76203, USA ; [email protected]
- Cooper Dix
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of North Texas , Denton, TX 76203, USA ; [email protected]
- Brandon M. Matthews
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of North Texas , Denton, TX 76203, USA ; [email protected]
- Ohad Shemmer
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of North Texas , Denton, TX 76203, USA ; [email protected]
- Michael S. Brotherton
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Wyoming , Laramie, WY 82071, USA
- Adam D. Myers
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Wyoming , Laramie, WY 82071, USA
- Gordon T. Richards
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, Drexel University , 32 S 32nd Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA
- Jaya Maithil
- ORCiD
- Center for Astrophysics ∣ Harvard & Smithsonian , 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
- Scott F. Anderson
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, University of Washington , Box 351580, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- W. N. Brandt
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Pennsylvania State University , University Park, PA 16802, USA; Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University , University Park, PA 16802, USA; Department of Physics, 104 Davey Lab, The Pennsylvania State University , University Park, PA 16802, USA
- Aleksandar M. Diamond-Stanic
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Bates College , Lewiston, ME 04240, USA
- Xiaohui Fan
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
- S. C. Gallagher
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Western Ontario , 1151 Richmond St, London, ON N6C 1T7, Canada
- Richard Green
- ORCiD
- Steward Observatory, University of Arizona , 933 North Cherry Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA
- Paulina Lira
- ORCiD
- Departamento de Astronoma, Universidad de Chile , Casilla 36D, Santiago, Chile
- Bin Luo
- ORCiD
- School of Astronomy and Space Science, Nanjing University , Nanjing, Jiangsu 210093, People’s Republic of China; Key Laboratory of Modern Astronomy and Astrophysics (Nanjing University) , Ministry of Education, Nanjing, Jiangsu 210093, People’s Republic of China
- Hagai Netzer
- ORCiD
- School of Physics and Astronomy, Tel Aviv University , Tel Aviv 69978, Israel
- Richard M. Plotkin
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics, University of Nevada , Reno, NV 89557, USA; Nevada Center for Astrophysics, University of Nevada , Las Vegas, NV 89154, USA
- Jessie C. Runnoe
- ORCiD
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, Vanderbilt University , Nashville, TN 37235, USA
- Donald P. Schneider
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, The Pennsylvania State University , University Park, PA 16802, USA; Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University , University Park, PA 16802, USA
- Michael A. Strauss
- ORCiD
- Department of Astrophysical Sciences, Princeton University , Princeton, NJ 08544, USA
- Benny Trakhtenbrot
- ORCiD
- School of Physics and Astronomy, Tel Aviv University , Tel Aviv 69978, Israel
- Jianfeng Wu
- ORCiD
- Department of Astronomy, Xiamen University , Xiamen, Fujian 361005, People’s Republic of China
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/acd04d
- Journal volume & issue
-
Vol. 950,
no. 2
p. 97
Abstract
Weak emission-line quasars (WLQs) are a subset of type 1 quasars that exhibit extremely weak Ly α + N v λ 1240 and/or C iv λ 1549 emission lines. We investigate the relationship between emission-line properties and accretion rate for a sample of 230 “ordinary” type 1 quasars and 18 WLQs at z < 0.5 and 1.5 < z < 3.5 that have rest-frame ultraviolet and optical spectral measurements. We apply a correction to the H β -based black hole mass ( M _BH ) estimates of these quasars using the strength of the optical Fe ii emission. We confirm previous findings that WLQs’ M _BH values are overestimated by up to an order of magnitude using the traditional broad-emission-line region size–luminosity relation. With this M _BH correction, we find a significant correlation between H β -based Eddington luminosity ratios and a combination of the rest-frame C iv equivalent width and C iv blueshift with respect to the systemic redshift. This correlation holds for both ordinary quasars and WLQs, which suggests that the two-dimensional C iv parameter space can serve as an indicator of accretion rate in all type 1 quasars across a wide range of spectral properties.
Keywords
