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Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) exhibit rapid, high-amplitude stochastic flux variations across the entire electromagnetic spectrum on time-scales ranging from hours to years. The cause of this variability is poorly understood. We present a Green's function-based method for using variability to (1) measure the time-scales on which flux perturbations evolve and (2) characterize the driving flux perturbations. We model the observed light curve of an AGN as a linear differential equation driven by stochastic impulses. We analyse the light curve of the Kepler AGN Zw 229-15 and find that the observed variability behaviour can be modelled as a damped harmonic oscillator perturbed by a coloured noise process. The model power spectrum turns over on time-scale 385 d. On shorter time-scales, the log-power-spectrum slope varies between 2 and 4, explaining the behaviour noted by previous studies.We recover and identify both the 5.6 and 67 d time-scales reported by previous work using the Green's function of the Continuous-time AutoRegressive Moving Average equation rather than by directly fitting the power spectrum of the light curve. These are the time-scales on which flux perturbations grow and on which flux perturbations decay back to the steady-state flux level, respectively. We make the software package KĀLĪ used to study light curves using our method available to the community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We gauge the impact of spacecraft-induced effects on the inferred variability properties of the light curve of the Seyfert 1 AGN Zw 229-15 observed by Kepler. We compare the light curve of Zw 229-15 obtained from the Kepler MAST data base with a reprocessed light curve constructed from raw pixel data. We use the first-order structure function, SF(δt), to fit both light curves to the damped power-law PSD (power spectral density) of Kasliwal et al. On short time-scales, we find a steeper log PSD slope (γ = 2.90 to within 10 per cent) for the reprocessed light curve as compared to the light curve found on MAST (γ = 2.65 to within 10 per cent) - both inconsistent with a damped random walk (DRW) which requires γ =2. The log PSD slope inferred for the reprocessed light curve is consistent with previous results that study the same reprocessed light curve. The turnover time-scale is almost identical for both light curves (27.1 and 27.5 d for the reprocessed and MAST data base light curves). Based on the obvious visual difference between the two versions of the light curve and on the PSD model fits, we conclude that there remain significant levels of spacecraft-induced effects in the standard pipeline reduction of the Kepler data. Reprocessing the light curves will change the model inferenced from the data but is unlikely to change the overall scientific conclusions reached by Kasliwal et al. - not all AGN light curves are consistent with the DRW. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We test the consistency of active galactic nuclei (AGN) optical flux variability with the damped random walk (DRW) model. Our sample consists of 20 multiquarter Kepler AGN light curves including both Type 1 and 2 Seyferts, radio-loud and -quiet AGN, quasars, and blazars. Kepler observations of AGN light curves offer a unique insight into the variability properties of AGN light curves because of the very rapid (11.6-28.6 min) and highly uniform rest-frame sampling combined with a photometric precision of 1 part in 105 over a period of 3.5 yr. We categorize the light curves of all 20 objects based on visual similarities and find that the light curves fall into five broad categories. We measure the first-order structure function of these light curves and model the observed light curve with a general broken power-law power spectral density (PSD) characterized by a short-time-scale power-law index γ and turnover time-scale τ. We find that less than half the objects are consistent with a DRW and observe variability on short time-scales (~2 h). The turnover time-scale τ ranges from ~10-135 d. Interesting structure function features include pronounced dips on rest-frame time-scales ranging from 10-100 d and varying slopes on different time-scales. The range of observed short-time-scale PSD slopes and the presence of dip and varying slope features suggests that the DRW model may not be appropriate for all AGN. We conclude that AGN variability is a complex phenomenon that requires a more sophisticated statistical treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]