Hydrostatic Gas Constraints on Supermassive Black Hole Masses: Implications for Hydrostatic Equilibrium and Dynamical Modelling in a Sample of Early-Type Galaxies

TL;DR

This study measures supermassive black hole masses in early-type galaxies using X-ray gas pressure, supporting hydrostatic equilibrium assumptions and aligning with dynamical methods, thus enhancing understanding of galaxy centers.

Contribution

It introduces a hydrostatic X-ray technique for SMBH mass measurement in early-type galaxies, validated against dynamical methods, and explores implications for galaxy modeling and accretion.

Findings

Good agreement between hydrostatic and dynamical SMBH mass measurements.

Stellar mass-to-light ratios match stellar population models with a Kroupa IMF.

High Bondi accretion rates correlate with lack of X-ray cavities, indicating delayed AGN feedback effects.

Abstract

We present new mass measurements for the supermassive black holes (SMBHs) in the centres of three early-type galaxies. The gas pressure in the surrounding, hot interstellar medium (ISM) is measured through spatially resolved spectroscopy with the Chandra X-ray observatory, allowing the SMBH mass (Mbh) to be inferred directly under the hydrostatic approximation. This technique does not require calibration against other SMBH measurement methods and its accuracy depends only on the ISM being close to hydrostatic, which is supported by the smooth X-ray isophotes of the galaxies. Combined with results from our recent study of the elliptical galaxy NGC4649, this brings to four the number of galaxies with SMBHs measured in this way. Of these, three already have mass determinations from the kinematics of either the stars or a central gas disc, and hence join only a handful of galaxies with Mbh measured by more than one technique. We find good agreement between the different methods, providing support for the assumptions implicit in both the hydrostatic and the dynamical models. The stellar mass-to-light ratios for each galaxy inferred by our technique are in agreement with the predictions of stellar population synthesis models assuming a Kroupa initial mass function (IMF). This concurrence implies that no more than ~10-20% of the ISM pressure is nonthermal, unless there is a conspiracy between the shape of the IMF and nonthermal pressure. Finally, we compute Bondi accretion rates, finding that the two galaxies with the highest rates exhibit little evidence of X-ray cavities, suggesting that the correlation with the AGN jet power takes time to be established.