On the dust tori in Palomar-Green quasars

Abstract

The dust clouds in the torus of the quasar are irradiated by the central source, and the clouds at the inner radius of the torus re-radiate mostly in the near-infrared (NIR) wavebands. The ratio of the near-infrared luminosity to the bolometric luminosity L_NIR/L_bol can therefore reflect the torus geometry to some extent. We find a significant correlation between the ratio of the near-infrared luminosity to the bolometric luminosity L_NIR/L_bol and the central black hole mass M_bh for the Palomar-Green(PG) quasars, whereas no correlation is found between the Eddington ratio L_bol/L_Edd and the ratio L_NIR/L_bol. Similar correlations are found for the mid-infrared and far-infrared cases. It may imply that the torus geometry, i.e., the solid angle subtended by the dust torus as seen from the central source, does not evolve with the accretion rate. The correlation of the solid angle subtended by the torus with the central black hole mass M_bh implies that the formation of the dust torus is likely regulated by the central black hole mass. We find that the torus thickness H increases with quasar bolometric luminosities, which is different from the constant torus thickness H with luminosity assumed in the receding torus model. The mean covering factor of the dust clouds at the inner radius of the torus derived from the IR emission data is ~0.39 for PG quasars. The average relative thickness H/R of the tori in the PG quasars derived from the ratios of the infrared to bolometric luminosities is ~0.9. We suggest that the further IR observations on a larger quasar sample including more fainter quasars by the Spitzer Space Telescope will help understand the physics of the dust tori in quasars.