The Mass of the Black Hole in NGC 5273 from Stellar Dynamical Modeling
Abstract
We present a new constraint on the mass of the black hole in the active S0 galaxy NGC 5273. Due to the proximity of the galaxy at 16.6 ± 2.1 Mpc, we were able to resolve and extract the bulk motions of stars near the central black hole using adaptive-optics-assisted observations with the Gemini Near-infrared Integral Field Spectrograph, as well as constrain the large-scale kinematics using archival Spectroscopic Areal Unit for Research and Optical Nebulae spectroscopy. High-resolution Hubble Space Telescope imaging allowed us to generate a surface-brightness decomposition, determine approximate mass-to-light ratios for the bulge and disk, and obtain an estimate for the disk inclination. We constructed an extensive library of dynamical models using the Schwarzschild orbit-superposition code FORSTAND, exploring a range of disk and bulge shapes, halo masses, etc. We determined a black hole mass of M • = [0.5-2] × 107 M ⊙, where the low side of the range is in agreement with the reverberation mapping measurement of M • = [4.7 ± 1.6] × 106 M ⊙. NGC 5273 is one of the few nearby galaxies that hosts a broad-lined active galactic nucleus, allowing a crucial comparison of black hole masses derived from independent mass-measurement techniques.
- Publication:
-
The Astrophysical Journal
- Pub Date:
- May 2023
- DOI:
- 10.3847/1538-4357/acc4bc
- arXiv:
- arXiv:2212.02484
- Bibcode:
- 2023ApJ...949...13M
- Keywords:
-
- Stellar dynamics;
- AGN host galaxies;
- Seyfert galaxies;
- Supermassive black holes;
- 1596;
- 2017;
- 1447;
- 1663;
- Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies
- E-Print:
- 20 pages, 11 figures, 3 tables