Galaxy-scale AGN feedback in the era of large spectroscopic surveys

by Luke Holden (University of Hertfordshire, UK)

Friday May 9, 2025, 10:00 AM → 11:30 AM Europe/Madrid

00.303.0 - Aula 13 (Facultad de Ciencias Físicas)

Over the past two decades, the impact of active galactic nuclei (AGN; accreting supermassive black holes) on their host galaxies has become a key component of our understanding of galaxy evolution. In particular, much focus has been placed on the galaxy-scale (10s of kiloparsec) impact of AGN, namely via the acceleration of bulk motions of gas -- known as AGN-driven outflows -- which heat and remove material that is needed to form stars. By developing and applying precise outflow-diagnostic techniques to observational data of several nearby AGN, we have been able to robustly quantify the properties of their outflows and hence the impact of the AGN on the host galaxies. However, these studies only focused on a few nearby, bright AGN, leaving it unclear how representative the results were for the general population. In this talk, I will discuss how upcoming large spectroscopic surveys such as WEAVE-LOFAR will be able to directly address this by applying the precise outflow diagnostics that we have developed to large, representative samples. This will produce the first accurate census of outflow properties at the population level, allowing for the true galaxy-scale impact of AGN to be robustly determined.