A Detailed Look at the Most Obscured Galactic Nuclei in the Mid-Infrared

TL;DR

This paper investigates the properties of Compact Obscured Nuclei (CONs) in the mid-infrared, demonstrating effective techniques for their identification and establishing correlations with millimeter emission lines, which enhances understanding of this obscured galaxy evolution phase.

Contribution

It introduces a method combining PAH equivalent width ratios and nuclear optical depth measurements to reliably identify CONs, improving detection robustness especially in inclined galaxies.

Findings

Nuclear optical depth correlates strongly with HCN-vib emission (r=0.91).

PAH EW ratios effectively select CONs, even in inclined galaxies.

Nuclear optical depth identifies CONs in approximately 36% of ULIRGs and 17% of LIRGs.

Abstract

Context. Compact Obscured Nuclei (CONs) are an extreme phase of galaxy evolution where rapid supermassive black hole growth and$/$or compact star-forming activity is completely obscured by gas and dust. Aims. We investigate the properties of CONs in the mid-infrared and explore techniques aimed at identifying these objects such as through the equivalent width (EW) ratios of their Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon (PAH) features. Methods. We model Spitzer spectra by decomposing the continua into nuclear and star-forming components from which we then measure the nuclear optical depth, $\tau_N$, of the $9.8 \mu$m silicate absorption feature. We also use Spitzer spectral maps to investigate how PAH EW ratios vary with aperture size for objects hosting CONs. Results. We find that the nuclear optical depth, $\tau_N$, strongly correlates with the HCN-vib emission line in the millimetre for CONs with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.91. We find the PAH EW ratios technique to be effective at selecting CONs and robust against highly inclined galaxies where strong dust lanes may mimic a CON like spectrum by producing a high $\tau_N$. Our analysis of the Spitzer spectral maps showed that the efficacy of the PAH EW ratios to isolate CONs is reduced when there is a strong star-forming component from the host galaxy. In addition, we find that the use of the inferred nuclear optical depth is a reliable method to identify CONs in $36^{+8}_{-7}\%$ of ULIRGs and $17^{+3}_{-3}\%$ of LIRGs, consistent with previous work. Conclusions. We confirm mid-IR spectra to be a powerful diagnostic of CONs where the increased sensitivity of JWST will allow identification of CONs at cosmic noon revealing this extreme but hidden phase of galaxy evolution.