Galaxy-wide Outflows Common Among Quasars

Observations using the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph on Gemini South reveal that galaxy-wide, high-velocity outflows are extremely common among galaxies that host luminous quasars. These outflows may represent a crucial stage in a galaxy’s evolution when the supermassive black hole at its center begins injecting vast amounts of mass and energy into the galaxy. Chris Harrison (Durham University) led this work, which is described briefly in a Gemini web feature, with full results in a preprint and publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

An example object from the GMOS observations. The background image is from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. The cyan rectangle shows the GMOS field of view. The red/yellow contours show the distribution of high-­‐velocity ionized gas. The inset shows an example oxygen emission-­‐line profile ([O III]5007) that was used to trace the velocity of the gas.