Fast Radiative Shocks in Dense Media. III. Properties of the Emission

Abstract

Evolution of fast, radiative shocks in high density medium is presented. Ionizing spectra and approximate broad band light curves of the shocked gas are calculated. Emergent shock spectra, as seen by a distant observer, are obtained from photoionization models. The emergent spectra have a power-law shape $F_{\nu}\propto{\nu}^{-\alpha}$ with mean spectral index $\alpha\sim0.6-1.0$ in the energy range $0.01-10$ keV, and have a high-energy cutoff corresponding to the original shock velocity. It is shown that the models exhibit promising features that may account for some photometric and spectral properties of Active Galactic Nuclei.