2024/09/20 by Weizhe Liu, Xiaohui Fan, Liu, Weizhe +51 · 5 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Galaxies: Formation, Evolution, Phenomena #Gamma-ray bursts and supernovae #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2409.13189
James Webb Space Telescope opens a new window to directly probe luminous quasars powered by billion solar mass black holes in the epoch of reionization and their co-evolution with massive galaxies with unprecedented details. In this paper, we report the first results from the deep NIRSpec integral field spectroscopy study of a quasar at z = 7.5. We obtain a bolometric luminosity of ∼1.8×1047 erg s-1 and a black hole mass of ∼0.7--2.5×109 M\odot based on Hβ emission line from the quasar spectrum. We discover ∼2 kpc scale, highly blueshifted (∼-870 km/s) and broad (∼1400 km/s) [O III] line emission after the quasar PSF has been subtracted. Such line emission most likely originates from a fast, quasar-driven outflow, the earliest one on galactic-scale known so far. The dynamical properties of this outflow fall within the typical ranges of quasar-driven outflows at lower redshift, and the outflow may be fast enough to reach the circumgalactic medium. Combining both the extended and nuclear outflow together, the mass outflow rate, ∼300 M\odotyr, is ∼60%--380% of the star formation rate of the quasar host galaxy, suggesting that the outflow may expel a significant amount of gas from the inner region of the galaxy. The kinetic energy outflow rate, ∼3.6×1044 erg s-1, is ∼0.2% of the quasar bolometric luminosity, which is comparable to the minimum value required for negative feedback based on simulation predictions. The dynamical timescale of the extended outflow is ∼1.7 Myr, consistent with the typical quasar lifetime in this era.