The Host Galaxy of the Dwarf Seyfert UGC 06728

TL;DR

This study provides detailed imaging and analysis of the dwarf Seyfert galaxy UGC 06728, revealing its barred lenticular structure, estimating its distance via globular cluster luminosity, and deriving key properties like stellar mass and AGN luminosity.

Contribution

It offers the first detailed morphological and photometric characterization of UGC 06728's host galaxy, including separation of the AGN and galaxy light, and estimates its distance and stellar mass.

Findings

UGC 06728 is a barred lenticular galaxy with prominent features.

Distance to UGC 06728 is estimated at 32.5 Mpc.

Stellar mass of the galaxy is approximately 8 billion solar masses.

Abstract

We present multi-color high-resolution imaging of the host galaxy of the dwarf Seyfert UGC 06728. As the lowest-mass black hole to be described with both a direct mass constraint and a spin constraint, UGC 06728 is an important source for comparison with black hole evolutionary models, yet little is known about the host galaxy. Using Hubble Space Telescope imaging in the optical and near-infrared, we find that UGC 06728 is a barred lenticular (SB0) galaxy with prominent ansae at the ends of the bar. We cleanly separated the AGN from the resolved galaxy with two-dimensional image decompositions, thus allowing accurate surface brightness profiles to be derived in all filters from the outer edge of the galaxy all the way into the nucleus. Based on a sample of 51 globular cluster candidates identified in the images, the globular cluster luminosity function predicts a distance to UCG 06728 of $32.5\pm3.5$ Mpc. Combining the galaxy photometry with the distance estimate, we derive a starlight-corrected AGN luminosity, the absolute magnitude of the galaxy, and a constraint on the galaxy stellar mass of $\log M_{\star}/M_{\odot}=9.9\pm0.2$.