Nuclear X-ray Activity in Low-Surface-Brightness Galaxies: Prospects for Constraining the Local Black Hole Occupation Fraction with a Chandra Successor Mission

TL;DR

This study explores the presence of massive black holes in low-surface-brightness galaxies using Chandra X-ray data, aiming to understand black hole occupation and its relation to galaxy evolution, and discusses future measurement prospects with advanced X-ray missions.

Contribution

It provides the first assessment of nuclear X-ray activity in LSBGs and evaluates the potential for future missions to constrain black hole occupation fractions.

Findings

12.5% of LSBGs show nuclear X-ray sources.

Detected X-ray nuclei suggest low-level black hole accretion.

Black hole activity correlates with stellar mass, not total baryonic mass.

Abstract

About half of nearby galaxies have a central surface brightness >1 magnitude below that of the sky. The overall properties of these low-surface-brightness galaxies (LSBGs) remain understudied, and in particular we know very little about their massive black hole population. This gap must be closed to determine the frequency of massive black holes at z=0 as well as to understand their role in regulating galaxy evolution. Here we investigate the incidence and intensity of nuclear, accretion-powered X-ray emission in a sample of 32 nearby LSBGs with the Chandra X-ray Observatory. A nuclear X-ray source is detected in 4 galaxies (12.5%). Based on an X-ray binary contamination assessment technique developed for normal galaxies, we conclude that the detected X-ray nuclei indicate low-level accretion from massive black holes. The active fraction is consistent with that expected from the stellar mass distribution of the LSBGs, but not their total baryonic mass, when using a scaling relation from an unbiased X-ray survey of normal galaxies. This suggests that their black holes co-evolved with their stellar population. In addition, the apparent agreement nearly doubles the number of galaxies available within ~100 Mpc for which a measurement of nuclear activity can efficiently constrain the frequency of black holes as a function of stellar mass. We conclude by discussing the feasibility of measuring this occupation fraction to a few percent precision below 1e10 solar masses with high-resolution, wide-field X-ray missions currently under consideration.