Jet acceleration of the fast molecular outflows in the Seyfert galaxy IC5063

TL;DR

This study provides evidence that radio jets in the Seyfert galaxy IC5063 accelerate molecular gas through fast shocks, influencing galaxy evolution by impacting star formation and gas dynamics.

Contribution

It demonstrates the direct association between radio jet activity and high-velocity molecular gas acceleration in IC5063, confirming jet-driven molecular outflows.

Findings

Molecular hydrogen gas reaches velocities up to 600 km/s.

High-velocity gas is associated with the western radio lobe.

Results support jet-driven acceleration of molecular outflows.

Abstract

Massive outflows driven by active galactic nuclei (AGN) are widely recognised to play a key role in the evolution of galaxies, heating the ambient gas, expelling it from the nuclear regions, and thereby affecting the star formation histories of the galaxy bulges. It has been proposed that the powerful jets of relativistic particles launched by some AGN can both accelerate and heat the molecular gas, which often dominates the mass budgets of the outflows. However, clear evidence for this mechanism in the form of detailed associations between the molecular gas kinematics and features in the radio-emitting jets has been lacking. Here we show that the warm molecular hydrogen gas in the western radio lobe of the Seyfert galaxy IC5063 is moving at high velocities - up to 600 km/s - relative to the galaxy disk. This suggests that the molecules have been accelerated by fast shocks driven into the interstellar medium (ISM) by the expanding radio jets. These results demonstrate the general feasibility of accelerating molecular outflows in fast shocks driven by AGN.