Multiwavelength Comparison of X-ray and Infrared Selected Active Galactic Nuclei

Active galactic nuclei emit energy across the entire electromagnetic spectrum. Using only one wavelength region to identify AGNs may miss sources with unique characteristics. In this work, we compare the multiwavelength properties of X-ray and infrared (IR) selected AGN in the COSMOS field for z<6. Our X-ray-selected AGN sample includes all sources with a 0.5-10 keV X-ray luminosity greater than 10⁴³ erg s^-1. We define our IR-selected AGN sample using the four Spitzer/IRAC channels. We find that both selection methods miss a significant fraction of AGNs that are identified using the competing method. X-ray AGN selection is able to capture the most diverse range of multiwavelength emission properties, but misses a fraction of heavily obscured AGNs. Meanwhile, IR AGN selection is generally biased towards more powerful, dusty AGNs.

*Thresa Kelly acknowledges support from Research Experience for Undergraduate program at the Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii-Manoa funded through NSF grant #2050710. Thresa Kelly would like to thank the Institute for Astronomy for their hospitality during the course of this project.Some of the data presented herein were obtained at the W. M. Keck Observatory, which is operated as a scientific partnership among the California Institute of Technology, the University of California and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Observatory was made possible by the generous financial support of the W. M. Keck Foundation. This research is based [in part] on data collected at Subaru Telescope, which is operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. We are honored and grateful for the opportunity of observing the Universe from Maunakea, which has the cultural, historical and natural significance in Hawai`{}i. The authors wish to recognize and acknowledge the very significant cultural role and reverence that the summit of Maunakea has always had within the indigenous Hawaiian community. We are most fortunate to have the opportunity to conduct observations from this mountain.

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Bulletin of the American Physical Society

2023 Fall Meeting of the APS Prairie Section

Thursday–Saturday, November 30–December 2 2023; University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri

Session T03: Astronomy/Cosmology/Particle Physics V

Abstract: T03.00008 : Multiwavelength Comparison of X-ray and Infrared Selected Active Galactic Nuclei*

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