The Energetics of Launching the Most Powerful Jets in Quasars: A Study of 3C82

TL;DR

This study analyzes the most distant and luminous quasar 3C 82, revealing its extremely powerful jets, high accretion rates, and the interplay between jet power and winds, offering insights into quasar outflow mechanisms.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed modeling of 3C 82's plasma state, estimates its unprecedented jet power, and explores the relationship between jet activity and ionized winds in quasars.

Findings

Jet power estimated at ~2.66 x 10^{47} ergs/sec, among the highest for quasars.

Protonic lobes are unlikely due to mass transport constraints.

Detected high ionization broad line wind with kinetic power ~10^{45} ergs/sec.

Abstract

3C 82 at a redshift of 2.87 is the most distant 3C (Third Cambridge Catalogue) quasar. Thus, it is a strong candidate to have the most luminous radio lobes in the Universe. 3C 82 belongs to the class of compact steep spectrum radio sources. We use single dish and interferometric radio observations in order to model the plasma state of these powerful radio lobes. It is estimated that the long-term time-averaged jet power required to fill these lobes with leptonic plasma is $\overline{Q} \approx 2.66 \pm 1.33 \times 10^{47} \rm{ergs/sec}$, among the largest time averaged jet powers from a quasar. Positing protonic lobes is not tenable since they would require two orders of magnitude more mass transport to the lobes than was accreted to the central black hole during their formation. The first high signal to noise optical spectroscopic observation obtained of this object indicates that there is a powerful high ionization broad line wind with a kinetic power $\sim 10^{45} \rm{ergs/sec}$ and a velocity $\sim 0.01$c. We also estimate from the broad lines in 2018 and the UV continuum in three epochs spread out over three decades that the accretion flow bolometric luminosity is $L_{\rm{bol}} \approx 3.2-5.8 \times 10^{46} \rm{ergs/sec}$. The ratio of $\overline{Q}/L_{\rm{bol}}\approx 6.91 \pm 3.41$, is perhaps the largest of any known quasar. Extremely powerful jets tend to strongly suppress powerful winds of ionized baryonic matter. Consequently, 3C 82 provides a unique laboratory for studying the dynamical limits of the central engine of outflow initiation in quasars.