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We present geometric and dynamical modeling of the broad line region for the multi-wavelength reverberation mapping campaign focused on NGC 5548 in 2014. The dataset includes photometric and spectroscopic monitoring in the optical and ultraviolet, covering the H$\beta$, C IV, and Ly$\alpha$ broad emission lines. We find an extended disk-like H$\beta$ BLR with a mixture of near-circular and outflowing gas trajectories, while the C IV and Ly$\alpha$ BLRs are much less extended and resemble shell-like structures. There is clear radial structure in the BLR, with C IV and Ly$\alpha$ emission arising at smaller radii than the H$\beta$ emission. Using the three lines, we make three independent black hole mass measurements, all of which are consistent. Combining these results gives a joint inference of $\log_{10}(M_{\rm BH}/M_\odot) = 7.64^{+0.21}_{-0.18}$. We examine the effect of using the $V$ band instead of the UV continuum light curve on the results and find a size difference that is consistent with the measured UV-optical time lag, but the other structural and kinematic parameters remain unchanged, suggesting that the $V$ band is a suitable proxy for the ionizing continuum when exploring the BLR structure and kinematics. Finally, we compare the H$\beta$ results to similar models of data obtained in 2008 when the AGN was at a lower luminosity state. We find that the size of the emitting region increased during this time period, but the geometry and black hole mass remain unchanged, which confirms that the BLR kinematics suitably gauge the gravitational field of the central black hole., Comment: 26 pages, 19 figures, 1 table, accepted for publication in ApJ

We report velocity-delay maps for prominent broad emission lines, Ly_alpha, CIV, HeII and H_beta, in the spectrum of NGC5548. The emission-line responses inhabit the interior of a virial envelope. The velocity-delay maps reveal stratified ionization structure. The HeII response inside 5-10 light-days has a broad single-peaked velocity profile. The Ly_alpha, CIV, and H_beta responses peak inside 10 light-days, extend outside 20 light-days, and exhibit a velocity profile with two peaks separated by 5000 km/s in the 10 to 20 light-day delay range. The velocity-delay maps show that the M-shaped lag vs velocity structure found in previous cross-correlation analysis is the signature of a Keplerian disk with a well-defined outer edge at R=20 light-days. The outer wings of the M arise from the virial envelope, and the U-shaped interior of the M is the lower half of an ellipse in the velocity-delay plane. The far-side response is weaker than that from the near side, so that we see clearly the lower half, but only faintly the upper half, of the velocity--delay ellipse. The delay tau=(R/c)(1-sin(i))=5 light-days at line center is from the near edge of the inclined ring, giving the inclination i=45 deg. A black hole mass of M=7x10^7 Msun is consistent with the velocity-delay structure. A barber-pole pattern with stripes moving from red to blue across the CIV and possibly Ly_alpha line profiles suggests the presence of azimuthal structure rotating around the far side of the broad-line region and may be the signature of precession or orbital motion of structures in the inner disk. Further HST observations of NGC 5548 over a multi-year timespan but with a cadence of perhaps 10 days rather than 1 day could help to clarify the nature of this new AGN phenomenon., Comment: 19 pages, 9 figures, ApJ in press

We present the Strategic Scientific Plan (SSP) for the direction and activities of the Gemini Observatory in the 2020s. The overarching goal is to ensure that Gemini best uses the available resources to serve the needs of its international user community throughout the coming decade. The actionable items fall into three general categories: (1) preserving Gemini's current facilities and strengths; (2) developing instrumentation and software systems, including data pipelines, to enable new scientific capabilities that build on those strengths; (3) strategizing how visiting instruments can deliver additional valuable capabilities. We provide a high-level timeline (schematically illustrated in one figure) for the main developments discussed in this SSP. The schedule is ambitious, but in light of the recent Gemini in the Era of Multi-Messenger Astronomy (GEMMA) award from the NSF, the plan becomes achievable. Lists of milestones are given for gauging progress. As these milestones are reached and new instruments become available, some current instruments will need to be retired; we make recommendations in this regard. The final section concludes by reemphasizing the importance of a strong partnership committed to the needs of all members., Comment: Basic version with minimal illustration, 30 pages with 4 figures. For richly illustrated versions with the same textual content, see: http://www.gemini.edu/news/gemini-strategic-scientific-plan

We present the first results from a reverberation-mapping campaign undertaken during the first half of 2012, with additional data on one AGN (NGC 3227) from a 2014 campaign. Our main goals are (1) to determine the black hole masses from continuum-Hbeta reverberation signatures, and (2) to look for velocity-dependent time delays that might be indicators of the gross kinematics of the broad-line region. We successfully measure Hbeta time delays and black hole masses for five AGNs, four of which have previous reverberation mass measurements. The values measured here are in agreement with earlier estimates, though there is some intrinsic scatter beyond the formal measurement errors. We observe velocity dependent Hbeta lags in each case, and find that the patterns have changed in the intervening five years for three AGNs that were also observed in 2007., Comment: Accepted for publication on ApJ; 32 pages, 16 figures, 10 tables

Modern astronomical surveys such as the Large Synoptic Sky Survey (LSST) promise an unprecedented wealth of discoveries, delivered in the form of ~10 million alerts of time-variable events per night. Astronomers are faced with the daunting challenge of identifying the most scientifically important events from this flood of data in order to conduct effective and timely follow-up observations. Several ongoing observing programs have proven databases to be extremely valuable in conducting efficient follow-up, particularly when combined with tools to select targets, submit observation requests directly to ground- and space-based facilities (manual, remotely-operated and robotic), handle the resulting data, interface with analysis software and share information with collaborators. We draw on experience from a number of follow-up programs running at LCOGT, all of which have independently developed systems to provide these capabilities, including the Microlensing Key Project (RoboNet, PI: Tsapras, Co-I: Street), the Global Supernovae Project (SNEx, PI: Howell), and the Near-Earth Object Project (NEOExchange, PI: Lister). We refer to these systems in general as Target and Observation Managers, or TOMs. Future projects, facing a much greater and rapidly-growing list of potential targets, will find such tools to be indispensable, but the systems developed to date are highly specialized to the projects they serve and are not designed to scale to the LSST alert rate. We present a project to develop a general-purpose software toolkit that will enable astronomers to easily build TOM systems that they can customize to suit their needs, while a professionally-developed codebase will ensure that the systems are capable of scaling to future programs., Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures, presented at SPIE: Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation, June 2018

We present optical continuum lags for two Seyfert 1 galaxies, MCG+08-11-011 and NGC 2617, using monitoring data from a reverberation mapping campaign carried out in 2014. Our light curves span the ugriz filters over four months, with median cadences of 1.0 and 0.6 days for MCG+08-11-011 and NGC\,2617, respectively, combined with roughly daily X-ray and near-UV data from Swift for NGC 2617. We find lags consistent with geometrically thin accretion-disk models that predict a lag-wavelength relation of $\tau \propto \lambda^{4/3}$. However, the observed lags are larger than predictions based on standard thin-disk theory by factors of 3.3 for MCG+08-11-011 and 2.3 for NGC\,2617. These differences can be explained if the mass accretion rates are larger than inferred from the optical luminosity by a factor of 4.3 in MCG+08-11-011 and a factor of 1.3 in NGC\,2617, although uncertainty in the SMBH masses determines the significance of this result. While the X-ray variability in NGC\,2617 precedes the UV/optical variability, the long 2.6 day lag is problematic for coronal reprocessing models., Comment: Accepted to ApJ, please send comments to faus@mit.edu. 24 pages, 8 figures

During the Space Telescope and Optical Reverberation Mapping Project (STORM) observations of NGC 5548, the continuum and emission-line variability became de-correlated during the second half of the 6-month long observing campaign. Here we present Swift and Chandra X-ray spectra of NGC 5548 obtained as a part of the campaign. The Swift spectra show that excess flux (relative to a power-law continuum) in the soft X-ray band appears before the start of the anomalous emission-line behavior, peaks during the period of the anomaly, and then declines. This is a model-independent result suggesting that the soft excess is related to the anomaly. We divide the Swift data into on- and off-anomaly spectra to characterize the soft excess via spectral fitting. The cause of the spectral differences is likely due to a change in the intrinsic spectrum rather than being due to variable obscuration or partial covering. The Chandra spectra have lower signal-to-noise ratios, but are consistent with Swift data. Our preferred model of the soft excess is emission from an optically thick, warm Comptonizing corona, the effective optical depth of which increases during the anomaly. This model simultaneously explains all the three observations: the UV emission line flux decrease, the soft-excess increase, and the emission line anomaly., Comment: ApJ in press. Replaced with the accepted version

We conduct a multiwavelength continuum variability study of the Seyfert 1 galaxy NGC 5548 to investigate the temperature structure of its accretion disk. The 19 overlapping continuum light curves (1158 to 9157 angstroms) combine simultaneous HST , Swift , and ground-based observations over a 180 day period from 2014 January to July. Light-curve variability is interpreted as the reverberation response of the accretion disk to irradiation by a central time-varying point source. Our model yields the disk inclination, i, temperature T1 at 1 light day from the black hole, and a temperature-radius slope, alpha. We also infer the driving light curve and find that it correlates poorly with both the hard and soft X-ray light curves, suggesting that the X-rays alone may not drive the ultraviolet and optical variability over the observing period. We also decompose the light curves into bright, faint, and mean accretion-disk spectra. These spectra lie below that expected for a standard blackbody accretion disk accreting at L/LEdd = 0.1, Comment: V2: Oops wrong title! V1: Accepted for publication in ApJ, 20 Pages, 11 Figures

We present the first results from an optical reverberation mapping campaign executed in 2014, targeting the active galactic nuclei (AGN) MCG+08-11-011, NGC 2617, NGC 4051, 3C 382, and Mrk 374. Our targets have diverse and interesting observational properties, including a "changing look" AGN and a broad-line radio galaxy. Based on continuum-H$\beta$ lags, we measure black hole masses for all five targets. We also obtain H$\gamma$ and He{\sc ii}\,$\lambda 4686$ lags for all objects except 3C 382. The He{\sc ii}\,$\lambda 4686$ lags indicate radial stratification of the BLR, and the masses derived from different emission lines are in general agreement. The relative responsivities of these lines are also in qualitative agreement with photoionization models. These spectra have extremely high signal-to-noise ratios (100--300 per pixel) and there are excellent prospects for obtaining velocity-resolved reverberation signatures., Comment: 34 pages, 12 figures, published in ApJ. For a video summarizing the main results, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KaC-jPsIY0Q

During an intensive Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) UV monitoring campaign of the Seyfert~1 galaxy NGC 5548 performed from 2014 February to July, the normally highly correlated far-UV continuum and broad emission-line variations decorrelated for ~60 to 70 days, starting ~75 days after the first HST/COS observation. Following this anomalous state, the flux and variability of the broad emission lines returned to a more normal state. This transient behavior, characterised by significant deficits in flux and equivalent width of the strong broad UV emission lines, is the first of its kind to be unambiguously identified in an active galactic nucleus reverberation mapping campaign. The largest corresponding emission-line flux deficits occurred for the high-ionization collisionally excited lines, C IV and Si IV(+O IV]), and also He II(+O III]), while the anomaly in Ly-alpha was substantially smaller. This pattern of behavior indicates a depletion in the flux of photons with E_{\rm ph} > 54 eV, relative to those near 13.6 eV. We suggest two plausible mechanisms for the observed behavior: (i) temporary obscuration of the ionizing continuum incident upon BLR clouds by a moving veil of material lying between the inner accretion disk and inner BLR, perhaps resulting from an episodic ejection of material from the disk, or (ii) a temporary change in the intrinsic ionizing continuum spectral energy distribution resulting in a deficit of ionizing photons with energies > 54 eV, possibly due to a transient restructuring of the Comptonizing atmosphere above the disk. Current evidence appears to favor the latter explanation., Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ, Friday 25th March 2016. A movie of the anomalous emission-line behavior can be found in the ancilliary documents

We present the first results from the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope (LCOGT) Network's Active Galactic Nuclei Key Project, a large program devoted to using the robotic resources of LCOGT to perform time domain studies of active galaxies. We monitored the Seyfert 1 galaxy Arp~151 (Mrk~40) for $\sim$200 days with robotic imagers and with the FLOYDS robotic spectrograph at Faulkes Telescope North. Arp~151 was highly variable during this campaign, with $V$-band light curve variations of $\sim$0.3 mag and H$\beta$ flux changing by a factor of $\sim$3. We measure robust time lags between the $V$-band continuum and the H$\alpha$, H$\beta$ and H$\gamma$ emission lines, with $\tau_\mathrm{cen} = 13.89^{+1.39}_{-1.41}$, 7.52$^{+1.43}_{-1.06}$ and 7.40$^{+1.50}_{-1.32}$ days, respectively. The lag for the \ion{He}{2} $\lambda4686$ emission line is unresolved. We measure a velocity-resolved lag for the H$\beta$ line, which is clearly asymmetric with higher lags on the blue wing of the line which decline to the red, possibly indicative of radial inflow, and is similar in morphology to past observations of the H$\beta$ transfer function shape. Assuming a virialization factor of $f$=5.5, we estimate a black hole mass of $M_\mathrm{BH}=6.2^{+1.4}_{-1.2}\times$10$^{6}$~$M_{\odot}$, also consistent with past measurements for this object. These results represent the first step to demonstrate the powerful robotic capabilities of LCOGT for long-term, AGN time domain campaigns that human intensive programs cannot easily accomplish. Arp 151 is now one of just a few AGN where the virial product is known to remain constant against substantial changes in H$\beta$ lag and luminosity., Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJL

We present ground-based optical photometric monitoring data for NGC 5548, part of an extended multi-wavelength reverberation mapping campaign. The light curves have nearly daily cadence from 2014 January to July in nine filters (\emph{BVRI} and \emph{ugriz}). Combined with ultraviolet data from the \emph{Hubble Space Telescope} and \emph{Swift}, we confirm significant time delays between the continuum bands as a function of wavelength, extending the wavelength coverage from 1158\,\AA\ to the $z$ band ($\sim\!9160$\,\AA). We find that the lags at wavelengths longer than the {\it V} band are equal to or greater than the lags of high-ionization-state emission lines (such as He\,{\sc ii}\,$\lambda 1640$ and $\lambda 4686$), suggesting that the continuum-emitting source is of a physical size comparable to the inner broad-line region (BLR). The trend of lag with wavelength is broadly consistent with the prediction for continuum reprocessing by an accretion disk with $\tau \propto \lambda^{4/3}$. However, the lags also imply a disk radius that is 3 times larger than the prediction from standard thin-disk theory, assuming that the bolometric luminosity is 10\% of the Eddington luminosity ($L = 0.1L_{\rm Edd}$). Using optical spectra from the Large Binocular Telescope, we estimate the bias of the interband continuum lags due to BLR emission observed in the filters. We find that the bias for filters with high levels of BLR contamination ($\sim\! 20\%$) can be important for the shortest continuum lags, and likely has a significant impact on the {\it u} and {\it U} bands owing to Balmer continuum emission., Comment: 26 pages, 10 figures, accepted to ApJ. For a brief video describing the main results of this paper, please see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaYtcDvIoP0&feature=youtu.be

We report the discovery of three new cases of QSOs acting as strong gravitational lenses on background emission line galaxies: SDSS J0827+5224 (zQSO = 0.293, zs = 0.412), SDSS J0919+2720 (zQSO = 0.209, zs = 0.558), SDSS J1005+4016 (zQSO = 0.230, zs = 0.441). The selection was carried out using a sample of 22,298 SDSS spectra displaying at least four emission lines at a redshift beyond that of the foreground QSO. The lensing nature is confirmed from Keck imaging and spectroscopy, as well as from HST/WFC3 imaging in the F475W and F814W filters. Two of the QSOs have face-on spiral host galaxies and the third is a QSO+galaxy pair. The velocity dispersion of the host galaxies, inferred from simple lens modeling, is between \sigma_v = 210 and 285 km/s, making these host galaxies comparable in mass with the SLACS sample of early-type strong lenses., Comment: 9 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in A&A

The narrow-line Seyfert 1 galaxy IRAS 07598+6508 is known to be a stong Fe II emitter. The analysis of several high S/N ratio spectra shows that its spectrum is dominated by a relatively narrow "broad line" region (1 780 km s$^{-1}$ FWHM) emitting not only Fe II, but also Ti II and Cr II lines. Although we were unable to find a completely satisfactory physical model, we got the best agreement with the observations with collisional rather than radiative models, with a high density (n=10$^{15}$ cm$^{-3}$), a high column density (N$_{H}$=10$^{25}$ cm$^{-2}$) and a microturbulence of 100 km s$^{-1}$. This BLR is qualitatively similar to the one observed in I Zw 1. We have not found traces in IRAS 07598+6508 of the narrow line regions found in I Zw 1., Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, accepted by A&A

The KPNO International Spectroscopic Survey (KISS) is an objective-prism survey for extragalactic emission-line objects. It combines many of the features of previous slitless spectroscopic surveys with the advantages of modern CCD detectors, and is the first purely digital objective-prism survey for emission-line galaxies. Here we present the second list of emission-line galaxy candidates selected from our red spectral data, which cover the wavelength range 6400 to 7200 A. In most cases, the detected emission line is H-alpha. The current survey list covers a 1.6-degree-wide strip located at Dec(1950) = 43d 30' and spans the RA range 11h 55m to 16h 15m. The survey strip runs through the center of the Bootes Void, and has enough depth to adequately sample the far side of the void. An area of 65.8 sq. deg. is covered. A total of 1029 candidate emission-line objects have been selected for inclusion in the survey list (15.6 per sq. deg.). We tabulate accurate coordinates and photometry for each source, as well as estimates of the redshift and emission-line flux and equivalent width based on measurements of the digital objective-prism spectra. The properties of the KISS emission-line galaxies are examined using the available observational data. Although the current survey covers only a modest fraction of the total volume of the Bootes Void, we catalog at least twelve objects that appear to be located within the void. Only one of these objects has been recognized previously as a void galaxy., Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal (April 2004); 20 pages, 12 figures

We obtained low-resolution, long-slit 5300--9100 A spectroscopy of NGC4826 (a nearby galaxy with an absorbing dust lane (DL) asymmetrically placed across its bulge, associated with several HII regions) with a slit encompassing its bulge, positioned across its nucleus. The wavelength-dependent effects of absorption and scattering by dust in the lane are evident when comparing the observed stellar SEDs of pairs of positions symmetrically located with respect to the nucleus, one on the DL side and one on the opposite side of the bulge, by assuming that the intrinsic ISRF is axi-symmetric. We analyzed these SED ratios through the multiple-scattering radiative transfer model of Witt and Gordon and we discovered strong residual Extended Red Emission (ERE) from a region of the DL within a distance of 13 arcsec from the nucleus, adjacent to a broad, bright HII region. ERE is an established phenomenon in the literature interpreted as originating from photoluminescence by nanometer-sized clusters, illuminated by UV/optical photons. The complex radial variation of the ERE band-integrated intensity and of the ERE-to-scattered light band-integrated intensity ratio with the optical depth of the model derived for the DL and with the strength and hardness of the illuminating ISRF is reproduced consistently through the theoretical interpretation of the photophysics of the ERE carrier by Smith and Witt. When examined within the context of ERE observations in a variety of Galactic dusty environments (e.g. the diffuse ISM, reflection nebulae, planetary nebulae and the Orion Nebula), we conclude that the ERE photon conversion efficiency in NGC4826 is as high as found elsewhere, but that the size of the actively luminescing nanoparticles there is about twice as large as those thought to exist in the Galactic diffuse ISM., Comment: 57 pages, 11 Postscript figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

The KPNO International Spectroscopic Survey (KISS) is a new objective-prism survey for extragalactic emission-line objects. It combines many of the features of previous slitless spectroscopic surveys with the advantages of modern CCD detectors, and is the first purely digital objective-prism survey for emission-line galaxies. Here we present the first list of emission-line galaxy candidates selected from our red spectral data, which cover the spectral range 6400 to 7200 Angstroms. In most cases, the detected emission line is H-alpha. The current survey list covers a one-degree-wide strip located at Dec (1950) = 29.5 degrees and spanning the RA range 12h 15m to 17h 0m. An area of 62.2 sq. degrees is covered. A total of 1128 candidate emission-line objects have been selected for inclusion in the survey list (18.1 per sq. degree). We tabulate accurate coordinates and photometry for each source, as well as estimates of the redshift and emission-line flux and equivalent width based on measurements of the digital objective-prism spectra. The properties of the KISS emission-line galaxies are examined using the available observational data., Comment: 18 pages, 9 figures, A.J. in press. Full resolution versions of Figures 1 & 2 are available at http://www.astro.wesleyan.edu/~slaz/research/kiss/kisspubs.html

The KPNO International Spectroscopic Survey (KISS) is a new objective-prism survey for extragalactic emission-line objects. It combines many of the features of previous slitless spectroscopic surveys that were carried out with Schmidt telescopes using photographic plates with the advantages of modern CCD detectors. It is the first purely digital objective-prism survey, and extends previous photographic surveys to substantially fainter flux limits. In this, the first paper in the series, we give an overview of the survey technique, describe our data processing procedures, and present examples of the types of objects found by KISS. Our first H-alpha-selected survey list detects objects at the rate of 18.1 per square degree, which is 181 times higher than the surface density of the Markarian survey.Since the sample is line-selected, there is an imposed redshift limit of z ~ 0.095 due to the filter employed for the objective-prism observations. We evaluate the quality of the observed parameters derived from the survey data, which include accurate astrometry, photometry, redshifts, and line fluxes. Finally, we describe some of the many applications the KISS database will have for addressing specific questions in extragalactic astronomy. Subsequent papers in this series will present our survey lists of emission-line galaxy candidates., Comment: 19 pages, 8 figures, A.J. in press

We conduct a multi-wavelength continuum variability study of the Seyfert 1 galaxy NGC 5548 to investigate the temperature structure of its accretion disk. The 19 overlapping continuum light curves (1158 Angstrom to 9157 Angstrom) combine simultaneous Hubble Space Telescope, Swift, and ground-based observations over a 180 day period from 2014 January to July. Light-curve variability is interpreted as the reverberation response of the accretion disk to irradiation by a central time-varying point source. Our model yields the disk inclination i = 36deg +/- 10deg, temperature T(sub 1) = (44+/-6) times 10 (exp 3)K at 1 light day from the black hole, and a temperature radius slope (T proportional to r (exp -alpha)) of alpha = 0.99 +/- 0.03. We also infer the driving light curve and find that it correlates poorly with both the hard and soft X-ray light curves, suggesting that the X-rays alone may not drive the ultraviolet and optical variability over the observing period. We also decompose the light curves into bright, faint, and mean accretion-disk spectra. These spectra lie below that expected for a standard blackbody accretion disk accreting at L/L(sub Edd) = 0.1.

The discovery of two magnetic white dwarfs culled from blue star surveys is reported. The surveys were carried out with the Mount Lemnon 1.5-meter reflecting telescope attached to a two-holer polarimeter/photometer. Spectral observations of the objects, (PG 1533 - 057, and K813 - 14), indicate the presence of hydrogen and Zeeman components. On the basis of dipolar field simulations, it is shown that PG 1533 - 057 has a polar field strength of 31 megagauss (MG) while K813 - 14 has a polar field strength of 29 MG. A third known white dwarf has a polar field strength of 18 MG. All the dwarfs had temperatures in the 11,000-20,000 K range. The possibility that a significant fraction of isolated magnetic degenerate stars could be the progeny of magnetic accreting binary systems is considered.