Abstract Details
| Name: Avni Paresh Parmar Affiliation: Pune University Conference ID: ASI2018_1307 Title : Jet kinematics of NGC 660 Authors and Co-Authors : Dr. Ilse van Bemmel (JIVE), Dr. Jay Blanchard (JIVE), Dr. Megan Argo (University of Central Lancashire, UK) Avni Parmar (JIVE) Abstract Type : Poster Abstract Category : Extragalactic astronomy Abstract : Nuclear activity in galaxies is currently assumed to occur in cycles. A single galaxy may experience multiple phases of activity, during which the central super-massive black hole grows through accretion. How these phases are triggered or quenched, is still unclear. In 2013, NRAO scientists proclaimed the serendipitous discovery of a radio outburst in NGC 660 galaxy resulting into a new compact source in its core. In the same year, e-MERLIN observations also recorded change in brightness of the source by a factor greater than 1200 as compared to the MERLIN pre-outburst limit. Over a timescale of ~1 decade the brightness and shape of the source has significantly changed. Observations indicate that the most likely cause is a new phase of nuclear activity. This makes NGC 660 an ideal target to study the triggering and early evolution of radio sources. With this motivation, a monitoring project was started using EVN (European VLBI Network) in late 2013 to observe this source at 1.4 GHz. We processed the available four epochs of EVN data (2013 - 2016) using AIPS and Difmap. In this talk, we will present the interesting results obtained from our work. From our data analysis, we find that the EVN observations are consistent with no change in the source over a time of three years. This implies that the source evolved to its current size within the first few years of its appearance, and the expansion since then came to a full stop. We discuss a few possible scenarios and follow-up plans for this study. |