Dartmouth Events

Abstract: Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) are the most sustained radiator of energy in the universe. Powered by accretion onto a supermassive black hole (SMBH) residing at a galaxy's center, AGN have played a prominent role in understanding galaxy evolution, where SMBH fueling and feedback processes have been proposed to influence the host on larger scales. Of particular interest are Seyfert II galaxies, characterized by their narrow emission lines, implying the high velocity gas near the SMBH is obscured. Supposing the obscuration is indeed from the nuclear region, these objects provide insight as to the fuelling process and large scale galaxy connection. However, conventional spectroscopic techniques sacrifice spatial information and modern Integrated Field Units (IFUs) only afford small fields of view, not suited to characterizing the galactic scale effects of nearby, large solid angle, AGN hosts. However, Fabry Perot Spectroscopy allows for large field of view spectrally resolved analysis of all relevant emission lines. Here I present analysis of nearby Seyfert II AGN using Fabry Perot Spectroscopy with the Southern African Large Telescope.  I reduce the Fabry Perot data, applying an accurate wavelength calibration, and making use of multiple dithers in order to produce a data cube of my objects surrounding relevant emission features. I make use of adaptive binning and nonlinear least squares minimization in order to characterize galaxy velocity and ionization as a function of position. This culminates in the creation of diagnostic maps which connect the outer portions of the host galaxy to the core.