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Discovery of the most ultra-luminous QSO using Gaia, SkyMapper and WISE
- Publication Year :
- 2018
-
Abstract
- We report the discovery of the ultra-luminous QSO SMSS~J215728.21-360215.1 with magnitude $z=16.9$ and W4$=7.42$ at redshift 4.75. Given absolute magnitudes of $M_{145,\rm AB}=-29.3$, $M_{300,\rm AB}=-30.12$ and $\log L_{\rm bol}/L_{\rm bol,\odot} = 14.84$, it is the QSO with the highest unlensed UV-optical luminosity currently known in the Universe. It was found by combining proper-motion data from Gaia DR2 with photometry from SkyMapper DR1 and the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). In the Gaia database it is an isolated single source and thus unlikely to be strongly gravitationally lensed. It is also unlikely to be a beamed source as it is not discovered in the radio domain by either NVSS or SUMSS. It is classed as a weak-emission-line QSO and possesses broad absorption line features. A lightcurve from ATLAS spanning the time from October 2015 to December 2017 shows little sign of variability.<br />Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in PASA
Details
- Database :
- arXiv
- Publication Type :
- Report
- Accession number :
- edsarx.1805.04317
- Document Type :
- Working Paper
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1017/pasa.2018.22