Large decay of X-ray flux in 2XMM J123103.2+110648: evidence for a tidal disruption event

Lin, Dacheng; Godet, O.; Ho, Luis C.; Barret, D.; Webb, N.; Irwin, Jimmy A.

doi:10.1093/mnras/stx489

Cited by 30 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 51 publications

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“…This number is made uncertain to the degree that the distribution of stellar orbits near an AGN is systematically different from the center of an inactive galaxy, and that the black hole in a galaxy with an AGN tends to be more massive than a galaxy without one (see also Karas & Šubr 2007;Kennedy et al 2016). Because both TDEs and AGNs vary on timescales of weeks to months, and because a TDE in an AGN presents less contrast against the prior state of the system than a TDE in an inactive galaxy, deciding whether an increase in brightness is due to a TDE or is merely AGN variability is not trivial (Komossa 2015;Kankare et al 2017;Auchettl et al 2018;Trakhtenbrot et al 2019b); indeed, there are a number of cases in which the correct identification of a particular episode of variation is disputed (e.g., Campana et al 2015;Grupe et al 2015;Merloni et al 2015;Saxton et al 2015;Blanchard et al 2017;Lin et al 2017;Wyrzykowski et al 2017;Mattila et al 2018;Shu et al 2018). It is therefore of interest to see if TDEs in AGNs have distinctive observational characteristics that allow us to recognize them more reliably.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tidal Disruption Events in Active Galactic Nuclei

Chan

Piran

Krolik

et al. 2019

ApJ

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A fraction of tidal disruption events (TDEs) occur in active galactic nuclei (AGNs) whose black holes possess accretion disks; these TDEs can be confused with common AGN flares. The disruption itself is unaffected by the disk, but the evolution of the bound debris stream is modified by its collision with the disk when it returns to pericenter. The outcome of the collision is largely determined by the ratio of the stream mass current to the azimuthal mass current of the disk rotating underneath the stream footprint, which in turn depends on the mass and luminosity of the AGN. To characterize TDEs in AGNs, we simulated a suite of stream-disk collisions with various mass current ratios. The collision excites shocks in the disk, leading to inflow and energy dissipation orders of magnitude above Eddington; however, much of the radiation is trapped in the inflow and advected into the black hole, so the actual bolometric luminosity may be closer to Eddington. The emergent spectrum may not be thermal, TDE-like, or AGN-like. The rapid inflow causes the disk interior to the impact point to be depleted within a fraction of the mass return time. If the stream is heavy enough to penetrate the disk, part of the outgoing material eventually hits the disk again, dissipating its kinetic energy in the second collision; another part becomes unbound, emitting synchrotron radiation as it shocks with surrounding gas.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tidal Disruption Events in Active Galactic Nuclei

Chan

Piran

Krolik

et al. 2019

ApJ

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“…In either case, the thermal X-ray spectrum appears to be a close analog to the disk-dominated spectrum that is typically seen in the high and soft states of XRBs. However, it was claimed that the ultrasoft X-ray spectra in the two AGNs could be associated with TDEs because both clearly show a long-term decline in the X-ray flux (Lin et al 2017;Shu et al 2018). More interestingly, Miniutti et al (2019) discovered a variability of ∼9 hour X-ray quasi-periodic eruptions (QPEs) in GSN 069 during its flux decay phase, casting intriguing questions about the origin of its ultra-soft X-ray emission.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Possible ∼0.4 h X-ray quasi-periodicity from an ultrasoft active galactic nucleus

Song

Shu

Sun

et al. 2020

A&A

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RX J1301.9+2747 is an ultrasoft active galactic nucleus (AGN) with unusual X-ray variability that is characterized by a long quiescent state and a short-lived flare state. The X-ray flares are found to recur quasi-periodically on a timescale of 13-20 ks. Here, we report the analysis of the light curve in the quiescent state from two XMM-Newton observations spanning 18.5 years, along with the discovery of a possible quasi-periodic X-ray oscillation (QPO) with a period of ∼1500s. The QPO is detected at the same frequency in the two independent observations, with a combined significance of >99.89%. The QPO is in agreement with the relation between frequency and black hole mass (M BH) that has been reported in previous works for AGNs and Galactic black hole X-ray binaries (XRBs). The QPO frequency is stable over almost two decades, suggesting that it may correspond to the high-frequency type found in XRBs and originates, perhaps, from a certain disk resonance mode. In the 3:2 twin-frequency resonance model, our best estimate on the M BH range implies that a maximal black hole spin can be ruled out. We find that all ultrasoft AGNs reported so far display quasiperiodicities in the X-ray emission, suggesting a possible link on the part of the extreme variability phenomenon to the ultrasoft X-ray component. This indicates that ultrasoft AGNs could be the most promising candidates in future searches for X-ray periodicities.

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“…Many TDEs have been identified through exploring XMM‐Newton data, for example, Lin et al (, , ); Saxton et al (); Saxton et al (); and notably through exploring the XMM‐Newton catalog (Rosen et al ), produced by the XMM‐Newton Survey Science Center (http://xmmssc.irap.omp.eu/) (SSC) (Watson et al ). The most recent version of this catalog was 3XMM‐DR8 and was released in May 2018 (http://xmmssc.irap.omp.eu/Catalogue/3XMM-DR8/3XMM_DR8.html).…”

Section: Tidal Disruption Events In Xmm‐newton Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

Automatic detection of tidal disruption events and other long‐duration transients in XMM‐Newton data

Webb

2019

Astron Nachr

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XMM-Newton's large field of view and excellent sensitivity have resulted in hundreds of thousands of serendipitous X-ray detections. While their spectra have been widely exploited, their variable nature has been little studied. Part of this is due to the way XMM-Newton currently operates, where observations generally have a 12-month proprietary period. It is often too late to follow-up a serendipitous transient a year after detection. New robust software could be introduced into the pipeline to automatically identify bright transients that are not the target of the observation. Statistically, hundreds of tidal disruption events (TDEs) have been detected serendipitously by XMM-Newton. With prior consent from the PI of the observation, an automatic alert to a new transient could be set up, allowing it to be followed-up within weeks, ideal for TDEs that are bright for about a year. Over the next decade, hundreds more TDEs should be detected. Following-up the brightest in quasi-real time would allow constraints to be made on the black hole mass, spin and accretion regime, and identify intermediate-mass black holes that are expected to be hidden in faint, low-mass galaxies. This article discusses the advantages that such changes would have on the follow-up of transients and TDEs.

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Large decay of X-ray flux in 2XMM J123103.2+110648: evidence for a tidal disruption event

Cited by 30 publications

References 51 publications

Tidal Disruption Events in Active Galactic Nuclei

Tidal Disruption Events in Active Galactic Nuclei

Possible ∼0.4 h X-ray quasi-periodicity from an ultrasoft active galactic nucleus

Automatic detection of tidal disruption events and other long‐duration transients in XMM‐Newton data

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