Mapping the radial structure of AGN tori
Makoto Kishimoto (1), Sebastian F. Hoenig (2), Robert Antonucci (2),, Florentin Millour (3), Konrad R.W. Tristram (1), Gerd Weigelt (1) ((1) MPIfR,, (2) UCSB, (3) FIZEAU)

TL;DR
This study uses mid-IR interferometry to map the radial dust distribution in AGN tori, revealing luminosity-dependent structural changes and challenging previous size-luminosity assumptions.
Contribution
It provides the first direct interferometric measurements of AGN tori's radial structure across a luminosity range, showing systematic size and density profile variations.
Findings
Higher luminosity AGNs are more compact in mid-IR normalized size.
Mid-IR emission size increases slowly with luminosity, nearly constant at 13 microns.
Radial dust density profiles change from steep to shallow with decreasing luminosity.
Abstract
We present mid-IR interferometric observations of 6 type 1 AGNs at multiple baseline lengths of 27--130m, reaching high angular resolutions up to lambda/B~0.02 arcseconds. For two of the targets, we have simultaneous near-IR interferometric measurements as well. The multiple baseline data directly probe the radial distribution of the material on sub-pc scales. Within our sample, which is small but spans over ~2.5 orders of magnitudes in the UV/optical luminosity L of the central engine, the radial distribution clearly and systematically changes with luminosity. First, we show that the brightness distribution at a given mid-IR wavelength seems to be rather well described by a power law, which makes a simple Gaussian or ring size estimation quite inadequate. Here we instead use a half-light radius R_1/2 as a representative size. We then find that the higher luminosity objects become more…
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