A1 Refereed original research article in a scientific journal

Delayed appearance and evolution of coronal lines in the TDE AT2019qiz




AuthorsShort P, Lawrence A, Nicholl M, Ward M, Reynolds TM, Mattila S, Yin C, Arcavi I, Carnall A, Charalampopoulos P, Gromadzki M, Jonker PG, Kim S, Leloudas G, Mandel I, Onori F, Pursiainen M, Schulze S, Villforth C, Wevers T

PublisherOXFORD UNIV PRESS

Publication year2023

JournalMonthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

Journal name in sourceMONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY

Journal acronymMON NOT R ASTRON SOC

Volume525

Issue1

First page 1568

Last page1587

Number of pages20

ISSN0035-8711

eISSN1365-2966

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stad2270

Web address https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/525/1/1568/7231814

Self-archived copy’s web addresshttps://research.utu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Publication/181181918


Abstract

Tidal disruption events (TDEs) occur when a star gets torn apart by a supermassive black hole as it crosses its tidal radius. We present late-time optical and X-ray observations of the nuclear transient AT2019qiz, which showed the typical signs of an optical-UV transient class commonly believed to be TDEs. Optical spectra were obtained 428, 481, and 828 rest-frame days after optical light-curve peak, and a UV/X-ray observation coincided with the later spectrum. The optical spectra show strong coronal emission lines, including [Fe VII], [Fe X], [Fe XI], and [Fe XIV]. The Fe lines rise and then fall, except [Fe XIV] that appears late and rises. We observe increasing flux of narrow H α and H β and a decrease in broad H α flux. The coronal lines have full width at half-maximum ranging from ~150−300 km s-1, suggesting they originate from a region between the broad- and narrow-line emitting gas. Between the optical flare and late-time observation, the X-ray spectrum softens dramatically. The 0.3-1 keV X-ray flux increases by a factor of ~50, while the hard X-ray flux decreases by a factor of ~6. Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer fluxes also rose over the same period, indicating the presence of an infrared echo. With AT2017gge, AT2019qiz is one of two examples of a spectroscopically confirmed optical-UV TDE showing delayed coronal line emission, supporting speculations that Extreme Coronal Line Emitters in quiescent galaxies can be echos of unobserved past TDEs. We argue that the coronal lines, narrow lines, and infrared emission arise from the illumination of pre-existing material likely related to either a previous TDE or active galactic nucleus activity.


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