Changing-Look Active Galactic Nuclei in SDSS-V: Host-Galaxy Properties and Black-Hole Scaling Relations
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arXiv
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| Natura: | Preprint |
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2025
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| author | Zeltyn, Grisha Trakhtenbrot, Benny Eracleous, Michael Anderson, Scott F. Ricci, Claudio Merloni, Andrea Runnoe, Jessie Krumpe, Mirko Aird, James Assef, Roberto J. Aydar, Catarina Bauer, Franz E. Brandt, W. N. Brownstein, Joel R. Buchner, Johannes Chatterjee, Kaushik Duffy, Laura Hernández-García, Lorena Hernández-Toledo, Héctor Koekemoer, Anton M. Morrison, Sean Peñaloza, Castalia Alenka Negrete Salvato, Mara Schneider, Donald P. Shen, Yue Śniegowska, Marzena |
| author_facet | Zeltyn, Grisha Trakhtenbrot, Benny Eracleous, Michael Anderson, Scott F. Ricci, Claudio Merloni, Andrea Runnoe, Jessie Krumpe, Mirko Aird, James Assef, Roberto J. Aydar, Catarina Bauer, Franz E. Brandt, W. N. Brownstein, Joel R. Buchner, Johannes Chatterjee, Kaushik Duffy, Laura Hernández-García, Lorena Hernández-Toledo, Héctor Koekemoer, Anton M. Morrison, Sean Peñaloza, Castalia Alenka Negrete Salvato, Mara Schneider, Donald P. Shen, Yue Śniegowska, Marzena |
| contents | Changing-look active galactic nuclei (CL-AGNs) exhibit dramatic spectral variability on unexpectedly short timescales, challenging standard accretion flow models. Despite growing samples, the physical drivers of this extreme variability, and the potential link to host-galaxy properties, remain unknown. Regardless of the underlying mechanism, the transition between AGN-dominated and host-dominated spectra offers a unique opportunity to study relations between AGNs and their hosts within the same objects. We present intermediate-resolution spectroscopy of 23 CL-AGNs identified by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey V (SDSS-V), obtained with the Very Large Telescope/X-shooter and Gemini-N/GMOS. An analysis of the Mgii emission line observed in the spectra demonstrates that the majority of these sources cannot be driven by variable obscuration. Our CL-AGNs roughly follow the M_BH-sigma_* and M_BH-M_* relations of inactive galaxies, with a median black hole-to-stellar mass ratio of 0.38%. We find no evidence that the stellar population properties of our CL-AGNs, including stellar mass, age, young stellar fraction, and star-formation rate, differ from those of type 2 AGNs in SDSS. These results suggest that CL-AGNs reside in typical AGN host galaxies and that their extreme variability is likely unrelated to host-galaxy environment, supporting the idea that CL-AGNs are not a distinct population, but rather represent a phase of normal AGN activity. This result, in turn, implies that CL-AGNs can serve as useful probes of the AGN-host connection, providing access to both AGN-dominated and host-dominated spectra of the same systems. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2511_07532 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Changing-Look Active Galactic Nuclei in SDSS-V: Host-Galaxy Properties and Black-Hole Scaling Relations Zeltyn, Grisha Trakhtenbrot, Benny Eracleous, Michael Anderson, Scott F. Ricci, Claudio Merloni, Andrea Runnoe, Jessie Krumpe, Mirko Aird, James Assef, Roberto J. Aydar, Catarina Bauer, Franz E. Brandt, W. N. Brownstein, Joel R. Buchner, Johannes Chatterjee, Kaushik Duffy, Laura Hernández-García, Lorena Hernández-Toledo, Héctor Koekemoer, Anton M. Morrison, Sean Peñaloza, Castalia Alenka Negrete Salvato, Mara Schneider, Donald P. Shen, Yue Śniegowska, Marzena Astrophysics of Galaxies Changing-look active galactic nuclei (CL-AGNs) exhibit dramatic spectral variability on unexpectedly short timescales, challenging standard accretion flow models. Despite growing samples, the physical drivers of this extreme variability, and the potential link to host-galaxy properties, remain unknown. Regardless of the underlying mechanism, the transition between AGN-dominated and host-dominated spectra offers a unique opportunity to study relations between AGNs and their hosts within the same objects. We present intermediate-resolution spectroscopy of 23 CL-AGNs identified by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey V (SDSS-V), obtained with the Very Large Telescope/X-shooter and Gemini-N/GMOS. An analysis of the Mgii emission line observed in the spectra demonstrates that the majority of these sources cannot be driven by variable obscuration. Our CL-AGNs roughly follow the M_BH-sigma_* and M_BH-M_* relations of inactive galaxies, with a median black hole-to-stellar mass ratio of 0.38%. We find no evidence that the stellar population properties of our CL-AGNs, including stellar mass, age, young stellar fraction, and star-formation rate, differ from those of type 2 AGNs in SDSS. These results suggest that CL-AGNs reside in typical AGN host galaxies and that their extreme variability is likely unrelated to host-galaxy environment, supporting the idea that CL-AGNs are not a distinct population, but rather represent a phase of normal AGN activity. This result, in turn, implies that CL-AGNs can serve as useful probes of the AGN-host connection, providing access to both AGN-dominated and host-dominated spectra of the same systems. |
| title | Changing-Look Active Galactic Nuclei in SDSS-V: Host-Galaxy Properties and Black-Hole Scaling Relations |
| topic | Astrophysics of Galaxies |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2511.07532 |