TY - JOUR
T1 - First-2MASS red quasars
T2 - Transitional objects emerging from the dust
AU - Glikman, Eilat
AU - Urrutia, Tanya
AU - Lacy, Mark
AU - Djorgovski, S. George
AU - Mahabal, Ashish
AU - Myers, Adam D.
AU - Ross, Nicholas P.
AU - Petitjean, Patrick
AU - Ge, Jian
AU - Schneider, Donald P.
AU - York, Donald G.
PY - 2012/9/20
Y1 - 2012/9/20
N2 - We present a sample of 120 dust-reddened quasars identified by matching radio sources detected at 1.4GHz in the Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty Centimeters survey with the near-infrared Two Micron All Sky Survey catalog and color-selecting red sources. Optical and/or near-infrared spectroscopy provide broad wavelength sampling of their spectral energy distributions that we use to determine their reddening, characterized by E(B - V). We demonstrate that the reddening in these quasars is best described by Small-Magellanic-Cloud-like dust. This sample spans a wide range in redshift and reddening (0.1 ≲ z ≲ 3, 0.1 ≲ E(B - V) ≲ 1.5), which we use to investigate the possible correlation of luminosity with reddening. At every redshift, dust-reddened quasars are intrinsically the most luminous quasars. We interpret this result in the context of merger-driven quasar/galaxy co-evolution where these reddened quasars are revealing an emergent phase during which the heavily obscured quasar is shedding its cocoon of dust prior to becoming a "normal" blue quasar. When correcting for extinction, we find that, depending on how the parent population is defined, these red quasars make up ≲ 15%-20% of the luminous quasar population. We estimate, based on the fraction of objects in this phase, that its duration is 15%-20% as long as the unobscured, blue quasar phase.
AB - We present a sample of 120 dust-reddened quasars identified by matching radio sources detected at 1.4GHz in the Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty Centimeters survey with the near-infrared Two Micron All Sky Survey catalog and color-selecting red sources. Optical and/or near-infrared spectroscopy provide broad wavelength sampling of their spectral energy distributions that we use to determine their reddening, characterized by E(B - V). We demonstrate that the reddening in these quasars is best described by Small-Magellanic-Cloud-like dust. This sample spans a wide range in redshift and reddening (0.1 ≲ z ≲ 3, 0.1 ≲ E(B - V) ≲ 1.5), which we use to investigate the possible correlation of luminosity with reddening. At every redshift, dust-reddened quasars are intrinsically the most luminous quasars. We interpret this result in the context of merger-driven quasar/galaxy co-evolution where these reddened quasars are revealing an emergent phase during which the heavily obscured quasar is shedding its cocoon of dust prior to becoming a "normal" blue quasar. When correcting for extinction, we find that, depending on how the parent population is defined, these red quasars make up ≲ 15%-20% of the luminous quasar population. We estimate, based on the fraction of objects in this phase, that its duration is 15%-20% as long as the unobscured, blue quasar phase.
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U2 - 10.1088/0004-637X/757/1/51
DO - 10.1088/0004-637X/757/1/51
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84866095699
SN - 0004-637X
VL - 757
JO - Astrophysical Journal
JF - Astrophysical Journal
IS - 1
M1 - 51
ER -