A comparative study of galaxy evolution with four different active galactic nucleus torus models and two different host geometries

TL;DR

This study compares four AGN torus models and two host galaxy geometries to assess their impact on estimating galaxy properties from spectral energy distributions, revealing that model choice significantly affects AGN fraction and galaxy classification.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive analysis of how different AGN torus models and host geometries influence galaxy property estimations using radiative transfer SED fitting.

Findings

AGN fraction varies greatly with torus model choice

Most galaxies are better fitted by spheroidal geometry

Method predicts higher SFR and lower stellar mass than CIGALE

Abstract

Estimating physical quantities such as the star formation rate, stellar mass and active galactic nucleus (AGN) fraction of galaxies is a key step in understanding galaxy formation and evolution. In order to estimate the uncertainties in the predicted values for these quantities, in this paper we explore the impact of adopting four different AGN torus models in fitting the multi-wavelength spectral energy distributions (SED) of galaxies. We also explore the impact of adopting two different geometries for the host, a spheroidal geometry, more appropriate for late-stage mergers, and a disc geometry, more appropriate for galaxies forming stars with secular processes. We use optical to submillimeter photometry from the Herschel Extragalactic Legacy Project (HELP) and utilize a Markov chain Monte Carlo SED-fitting code. We use exclusively radiative transfer models for the AGN torus as well as for the starburst and host galaxy. We concentrate on a sample of 200 galaxies at z~2, selected in the ELAIS-N1 field. All galaxies have a detection at 250um which ensures the presence of a starburst. We find that the stellar mass and star formation rate of the galaxies can be robustly estimated by the SED fitting but the AGN fraction depends very much on the adopted torus model. We also find that the vast majority of the galaxies in our sample are better fitted by a spheroidal geometry and lie above the main sequence. Our method predicts systematically higher SFR and lower stellar mass than the popular energy balance method CIGALE.