TY - JOUR
T1 - Tracing the Milky Way's Vestigial Nuclear Jet
AU - Cecil, Gerald
AU - Wagner, Alexander Y.
AU - Bland-Hawthorn, Joss
AU - Bicknell, Geoffrey V.
AU - Mukherjee, Dipanjan
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved..
PY - 2021/12/1
Y1 - 2021/12/1
N2 - MeerKAT radio continuum and XMM-Newton X-ray images have recently revealed a spectacular bipolar channel at the Galactic Center that spans several degrees (~0.5 kpc). An intermittent jet likely formed this channel and is consistent with earlier evidence of a sustained, Seyfert-level outburst fueled by black hole accretion onto Sgr A* several Myr ago. Therefore, to trace a now weak jet that perhaps penetrated, deflected, and percolated along multiple paths through the interstellar medium, relevant interactions are identified and quantified in archival X-ray images, Hubble Space Telescope Paschen a images and Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array millimeter-wave spectra, and new SOAR telescope IR spectra. Hydrodynamical simulations are used to show how a nuclear jet can explain these structures and inflate the ROSAT/eROSITA X-ray and Fermi ?-ray bubbles that extend 75 from the Galactic plane. Thus, our Galactic outflow has features in common with energetic, jet-driven structures in the prototypical Seyfert galaxy NGC 1068.
AB - MeerKAT radio continuum and XMM-Newton X-ray images have recently revealed a spectacular bipolar channel at the Galactic Center that spans several degrees (~0.5 kpc). An intermittent jet likely formed this channel and is consistent with earlier evidence of a sustained, Seyfert-level outburst fueled by black hole accretion onto Sgr A* several Myr ago. Therefore, to trace a now weak jet that perhaps penetrated, deflected, and percolated along multiple paths through the interstellar medium, relevant interactions are identified and quantified in archival X-ray images, Hubble Space Telescope Paschen a images and Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array millimeter-wave spectra, and new SOAR telescope IR spectra. Hydrodynamical simulations are used to show how a nuclear jet can explain these structures and inflate the ROSAT/eROSITA X-ray and Fermi ?-ray bubbles that extend 75 from the Galactic plane. Thus, our Galactic outflow has features in common with energetic, jet-driven structures in the prototypical Seyfert galaxy NGC 1068.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85121017740&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3847/1538-4357/ac224f
DO - 10.3847/1538-4357/ac224f
M3 - Article
SN - 0004-637X
VL - 922
JO - Astrophysical Journal
JF - Astrophysical Journal
IS - 2
M1 - 254
ER -