Catching butterflies in the sky: Extended catalog of winged or X-shaped radio sources from the latest FIRST data release

TL;DR

This paper presents a significantly expanded catalog of 290 winged or X-shaped radio galaxies from the latest FIRST data, combining multi-frequency data to identify new candidates and analyze their properties.

Contribution

The study provides the largest catalog of X-shaped radio galaxies to date, including new candidate identifications and multi-frequency analysis for better understanding of their characteristics.

Findings

Almost twice as many XRG candidates as previously known.

Identification of 25 quasars among the candidates.

Some candidates exhibit flat radio spectra, indicating potential for further study.

Abstract

We present a catalog of 290 "winged" or X-shaped radio galaxies (XRGs) extracted from the latest (2014 December 17) data release of the "Very Large Array Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty centimeter." We have combined these radio images with their counterparts in the TIFR GMRT sky survey at 150 MHz, in an attempt to identify any low surface brightness radio emission present in these sources. This has enabled us to assemble a sample of 106 "strong" XRG candidates and 184 "probable" XRG candidates whose XRG designation needs to be verified by further observations. The present sample of 290 XRG candidates is almost twice as large as the number of XRGs currently known. Twenty-five of our 290 XRG candidates (9 "strong" and 16 "probable") are identified as quasars. Double-peaked narrow emission lines are seen in the optical spectra of three of the XRG candidates (two "strong" and one "probable"). Nearly 90% of the sample is located in the FR II domain of the Owen-Ledlow diagram. A few of the strong XRG candidates have a rather flat radio spectrum (spectral index alpha flatter than -0.3) between 150 MHz and 1.4 GHz, or between 1.4 and 5 GHz. Since this is not expected for lobe-dominated extragalactic radio sources (like nearly all known XRGs), these sources are particularly suited for follow-up radio imaging and near-simultaneous measurement of the radio spectrum.