1. Discovery and Follow-up of ASASSN-23bd (AT 2023clx): The Lowest Redshift and Least Luminous Tidal Disruption Event To Date
- Author
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Hoogendam, W. B., Hinkle, J. T., Shappee, B. J., Auchettl, K., Kochanek, C. S., Stanek, K. Z., Maksym, W. P., Tucker, M. A., Huber, M. E., Morrell, N., Burns, C. R., Hey, D., Holoien, T. W. -S., Prieto, J. L., Stritzinger, M., Do, A., Polin, A., Ashall, C., Brown, P. J., DerKacy, J. M., Ferrari, L., Galbany, L., Hsiao, E. Y., Kumar, S., Lu, J., and Stevens, C. P.
- Subjects
Astrophysics - High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena - Abstract
We report the All-Sky Automated Survey for SuperNovae discovery of the tidal disruption event (TDE) ASASSN-23bd (AT 2023clx) in NGC 3799, a LINER galaxy with no evidence of strong AGN activity over the past decade. With a redshift of $z = 0.01107$ and a peak UV/optical luminosity of $(5.4\pm0.4)\times10^{42}$ erg s$^{-1}$, ASASSN-23bd is the lowest-redshift and least-luminous TDE discovered to date. Spectroscopically, ASASSN-23bd shows H$\alpha$ and He I emission throughout its spectral time series, and the UV spectrum shows nitrogen lines without the strong carbon and magnesium lines typically seen for AGN. Fits to the rising ASAS-SN light curve show that ASASSN-23bd started to brighten on MJD 59988$^{+1}_{-1}$, $\sim$9 days before discovery, with a nearly linear rise in flux, peaking in the $g$ band on MJD $60000^{+3}_{-3}$. Scaling relations and TDE light curve modelling find a black hole mass of $\sim$10$^6$ $M_\odot$, which is on the lower end of supermassive black hole masses. ASASSN-23bd is a dim X-ray source, with an upper limit of $L_{0.3-10\,\mathrm{keV}} < 1.0\times10^{40}$ erg s$^{-1}$ from stacking all \emph{Swift} observations prior to MJD 60061, but with soft ($\sim 0.1$ keV) thermal emission with a luminosity of $L_{0.3-2 \,\mathrm{keV}}\sim4\times10^{39}$ erg s$^{-1}$ in \emph{XMM-Newton} observations on MJD 60095. The rapid $(t < 15$ days) light curve rise, low UV/optical luminosity, and a luminosity decline over 40 days of $\Delta L_{40}\approx-0.7$ make ASASSN-23bd one of the dimmest TDEs to date and a member of the growing ``Low Luminosity and Fast'' class of TDEs., Comment: 17 pages, 13 figures, submitted to MNRAS
- Published
- 2024