Program: GS-2022B-Q-234

Title:Hidden Mergers in Luminous Obscured AGN
PI:Michael Koss
Co-I(s): Ezequiel Treister, Franz Bauer, Claudio Ricci, Richard Mushotzky, Jonathan Williams, Laura Blecha, George Privon

Abstract

Major galaxy mergers represent a critical stage in galaxy evolution and are directly linked to the most violent episodes of the growth of their central supermassive black holes. Observationally, however, this connection is not well understood, as the relatively small spatial scales involved require very high resolution data, and the nuclear regions of these mergers are often heavily obscured by dust and gas. Using high-resolution near-IR (NIR) imaging of nearby hard X-ray selected AGN from the Swift/BAT sample, a hidden population of late-stage nuclear mergers (<3 kpc) was recently found among luminous obscured AGN. We propose a high-spatial resolution NIR imaging program on 16 high-luminosity, high-Eddington ratio AGN, to extend this study to nearby (z<0.1) dust-obscured AGN towards the extreme regime in luminosity in the local universe at 100 pc scales.