A1 Refereed original research article in a scientific journal

Megamaser Disks Reveal a Broad Distribution of Black Hole Mass in Spiral Galaxies




AuthorsJ. E. Greene, A. Seth, M. Kim, R. Läsker, A. Goulding, F. Gao, J. A. Braatz, C. Henkel, J. Condon, K. Y. Lo, W. Zhao

Publication year2016

Journal: Astrophysical Journal Letters

Journal acronymApJ

Article numberL32

Volume826

Issue2

Number of pages6

ISSN2041-8205

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8205/826/2/L32


Abstract

We use new precision measurements of black hole (BH) masses from water
megamaser disks to investigate scaling relations between macroscopic
galaxy properties and supermassive BH mass. The megamaser-derived BH
masses span 106-108 {M},
while all the galaxy properties that we examine (including total stellar
mass, central mass density, and central velocity dispersion) lie within
a narrower range. Thus, no galaxy property correlates tightly with
{M}{BH} in ˜L* spiral galaxies as traced by megamaser
disks. Of them all, stellar velocity dispersion provides the tightest
relation, but at fixed {σ }* the mean megamaser
{M}{BH} are offset by -0.6 ± 0.1 dex relative to
early-type galaxies. Spiral galaxies with non-maser dynamical BH masses
do not appear to show this offset. At low mass, we do not yet know the
full distribution of BH mass at fixed galaxy property; the non-maser
dynamical measurements may miss the low-mass end of the BH distribution
due to an inability to resolve their spheres of influence and/or
megamasers may preferentially occur in lower-mass BHs.



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