AGN Lifetimes in UV-selected Galaxies: A Clue to Supermassive Black Hole-galaxy Coevolution

Abstract

The coevolution between supermassive black holes (SMBHs) and their host galaxies has been proposed for more than a decade, albeit with little direct evidence about black hole accretion activities regulating galaxy star formation at z > 1. In this paper, we study the lifetimes of X-ray active galactic nuclei (AGNs) in UV-selected red sequence (RS), blue cloud (BC) and green valley (GV) galaxies, finding that AGN accretion activities are most prominent in GV galaxies at z ∼ 1.5–2, compared with RS and BC galaxies. We also compare AGN accretion timescales with typical color transition timescales of UV-selected galaxies. We find that the lifetime of GV galaxies at z ∼ 1.5–2 is very close to the typical timescale when the AGNs residing in them stay in the high-accretion-rate mode at these redshifts; for BC galaxies, the consistency between the color transition timescale and the black hole strong accretion lifetime is more likely to happen at lower redshifts (z < 1). Our results support the scenario where AGN accretion activities govern UV color transitions of host galaxies, making galaxies and their central SMBHs coevolve with each other.

Large-scale Dynamics of Line-driven Winds with the Re-radiation Effect

“…It is believed that winds play a momentous role in AGNs feedback. Both winds and AGNs radiation can interact with their host galaxies (Zhang et al 2021;Lin et al 2022). The radiation from AGNs can heat the interstellar medium (ISM) and affect the properties of ISM (Ciotti et al 2009;Yuan & Narayan 2014).…”

“…The radiation from AGNs can heat the interstellar medium (ISM) and affect the properties of ISM (Ciotti et al 2009;Yuan & Narayan 2014). The winds can interact with ISM effectively and result in their co-evolution (Ostriker et al 2010;Weinberger et al 2017;Yuan et al 2018;Lin et al 2022).…”

The Black Hole Mass Function across Cosmic Time. II. Heavy Seeds and (Super)Massive Black Holes

“…In fact, targeted X-ray observations in the high-redshift star-forming progenitors of local massive galaxies have started to reveal the early growth of a dust-enshrouded (super)massive BH in their nuclear regions (e.g., Mullaney et al 2012;Page et al 2012;Delvecchio et al 2014;Rodighiero et al 2015Rodighiero et al , 2019Fiore et al 2017;Stanley et al 2015Stanley et al , 2017Massardi et al 2018;Combes et al 2019;D'Amato et al 2020) before it attains a high enough mass and power to manifest as a bright AGN and eventually reduce/ quench star formation and partly evacuate gas and dust from the host (e.g., Granato et al 2001Granato et al , 2004Lapi et al 2011Lapi et al , 2014Lapi et al , 2018. Another, albeit more indirect, indication of coevolution for the bulk of the BH and the host stellar mass comes from the similarity between the activity timescales of the central BH to the transition timescale of (green valley) galaxies from the blue cloud to the red sequence (see Wang et al 2017;Lin et al 2021Lin et al , 2022 this is true apart from rejuvenations at late cosmic times; see Martin-Navarro et al 2022).…”

[O iii] 5007 Å Emission Line Width as a Surrogate for σ ∗ in Type 1 AGNs?

“…The study of the correlations between M BH and the properties of their host galaxies is important in understanding the physical nature and the growth history of AGNs. Over the last two decades, there have been many studies investigating the coevolution between supermassive black holes and their host galaxies (e.g., Ferrarese & Merritt 2000;Gebhardt et al 2000;McLure & Jarvis 2002;Tremaine et al 2002;Woo et al 2006Woo et al , 2010Xue et al 2010;Kormendy & Ho 2013;Le et al 2014;Sun et al 2015;Shankar et al 2016;Xue 2017;Le & Woo 2019;Shankar et al 2019;Woo et al 2019;Ayubinia et al 2022;Lin et al 2022). The tight correlations between M BH and their host galaxies suggest that black holes and their hosts are coevolving and regulating each other.…”