A high angular resolution view of the PAH emission in Seyfert galaxies using JWST/MRS data

Journal article

This is the second in a series of papers in which we use JWST MIRI multiband imaging to measure the warm dust emission in a sample of 31 multiply imaged quasars, to be used as a probe of the particle nature of dark matter. We present measurements of the relative magnifications of the strongly lensed warm dust emission in a sample of 9 systems. The warm dust region is compact and sensitive to perturbations by populations of halos down to masses $\sim 10^6$ M$_{\odot}$. Using these warm dust flux-ratio measurements in combination with 5 previous narrow-line flux-ratio measurements, we constrain the halo mass function. In our model, we allow for complex deflector macromodels with flexible third and fourth-order multipole deviations from ellipticity, and we introduce an improved model of the tidal evolution of subhalos. We constrain a WDM model and find an upper limit on the half-mode mass of $10^{7.6} M_\odot$ at posterior odds of 10:1. This corresponds to a lower limit on a thermally produced dark matter particle mass of 6.1 keV. This is the strongest gravitational lensing constraint to date, and comparable to those from independent probes such as the Ly$\alpha$ forest and Milky Way satellite galaxies

Authors: García-Bernete, I; Rigopoulou, D; Alonso-Herrero, A; Donnan, FR; Roche, PF

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: EDP Sciences
• Journal: Astronomy & Astrophysics
• Volume: 666
• Pages: L5-L5
• Publication date: 2022-09-23
• Acceptance date: 2022-09-20
• DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/202244806
• EISSN: 1432-0746
• ISSN: 0004-6361
• Language: English
• Keywords: Luminous infrared galaxy; Astrophysics; Ionization; Physics; Astronomy; Galaxy; Emission spectrum; Angular resolution (graph drawing); Spectroscopy; Ion; Spectral line; Star formation