Fermi Blazars in the Zwicky Transient Facility Survey:Properties of Large Optical Variations

We analyze the optical light curve data,obtained with the Zwicky Transient Facility(ZTF)survey,for 47 γ-ray blazars monitored by the Large Area Telescope onboard the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope(Fermi).These 47sources are selected because they are among the Fermi blazars with the largest optical variations in the ZTF data.Two color-magnitude variation patterns are seen in them,with one being redder-to-stable-when-brighter(RSWB;in 31 sources)and the other being stable when brighter(in 16 sources).The patterns fit with the results recently reported in several similar studies with different data.Moreover,we find that the colors in the stable state of the sources share similar values,for which(after being corrected for the Galactic extinction)most sources are in a range of 0.4–0.55.This feature could be intrinsic and may be applied in,for example,study of the intragalactic medium.We also determine the turning points for the sources showing the RSWB pattern,after which the color changes saturate and become stable.We find a correlation between optical fluxes and γ-ray fluxes at the turning points.The physical implications of the correlation remain to be investigated,probably better with a sample of high-qualityγ-ray flux measurements.

Fermi Blazars in the Zwicky Transient Facility Survey:A Correlation Study

We report on our correlation analysis for theγ-ray blazars detected with the Large Area Telescope(LAT)onboard the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope(Fermi),for which we use the Fermi-LAT data and the optical zr and zg band data from the Zwicky Transient Facility survey in the time period approximately from 2018 July to 2022February.We start from the full sample of the Fermi-LAT blazars and find~38%of them as significant variables in bothγ-ray and optical bands.Among the variables,which are 705 blazars,95 are selected as our targets based on the requirement for theγ-ray brightnesses.Then 15 out of the 95 blazars are found to show theγ-ray-optical correlations in the~3.7 yr time period.Most of the 15 blazars are classified as low synchrotron peaked(LSP)ones with the time lags between theγ-ray and optical bands in a range from-19 to+25 days.The results generally fit the often-considered emission scenario for the LSP blazars.Two cases of showing~-100 days time lags are discussed,which require farther studies for confirmation.Our analysis results suggest that among the detected significant variables,~23%LSPs can showγ-ray and optical correlations,while their averageγ-ray fluxes are above~4×10^(-8)photon cm^(-2)s^(-1).

Comprehensive Study of the Blazars from Fermi-LAT LCR: The Log-Normal Flux Distribution and Linear rms–Flux Relation

Fermi-LAT LCR provides continuous and regularly sampled gamma-ray light curves, spanning about 14 yr, for a large sample of blazars. The log-normal flux distribution and linear rms–flux relation of the light curves for a few Fermi blazars have been examined in previous studies. However, the probability that blazars exhibit the log-normal flux distribution and linear rms–flux relation in their gamma-ray light curves has not been systematically explored.In this study, we comprehensively research the distribution of γ-ray flux and the statistical characteristics on a large sample of 1414 variable blazars from the Fermi-LAT LCR catalog, including 572 FSRQs, 477 BL Lacs, and 365BCUs, and statistically compare their flux distributions with normal and log-normal distributions. The results indicate that the probability of not rejecting log-normal is 42.05% for the large sample, and there is still a 2.05%probability of not rejecting normality, based on the joint of Kolmogorov–Smirnov, Shapiro–Wilk, and Normality tests. We further find that the probability that BL Lacs conform to the log-normal distribution is higher than that of FSRQs. Besides, after removing sources with less than 200 data points from this large sample, a sample of 549blazars, which is still a large sample compared to the previous studies, was obtained. Based on dividing the light curves into segments every 20 points(or 40 points, or one year), we fitted the linear rms–flux relation of these three different sets and found that the Pearson correlation coefficients are all close to 1 for most blazars. This result indicates a strong linear correlation between the rms and the flux of these 549 blazars. The log-normal distribution and linear rms–flux relation indicate that the variability of the γ-ray flux for most blazars is a non-linear and multiplicative process.

Optical quasi-periodic oscillation and color behavior of blazar PKS 2155–304

PKS 2155-304 is a well studied BL Lac object in the southern sky. The historical optical data during different periods have been collected and compiled. Light curves spanning 35 yr have been constructed. The R-band light curve has been ana- lyzed by means of three methods： the epoch folding method, the Jurkevich method and the discrete correlation function method. It is derived that there is an evident periodic component of 317 d （i.e. 0.87 yr） superposed on a long-term trend with large- amplitude variation in the light curve. The variability of this source is accompanied by a slight color variation, and the brightness and color index are correlated with each other. On a long-term time scale, PKS 2155-304 exhibits a tendency of bluer-when- brighter, which means the spectrum becomes flatter when the source brightens.

A Possible 456-Day Optical Period of OQ 530

The post-1994 observations of the blazar OQ 530 in optical BVRI bands, and radio observations at 22 GHz and 37 GHz were collected. The date compensated discrete Fourier transform （DCDFr） and CLEANest methods were used to search for possible periodicities. Two possible periods of 456±100 days and 258±29 days were found in the optical bands. The existence of possible correlations between the optical and radio emissions was investigated by means of discrete correlation function （DCF） analysis, and no significant correlation was found. Some possible mechanisms for the periodic variability are discussed.

Statistics of Superluminal Motion in Active Galactic Nuclei

We have collected an up-to-date sample of 123 superluminal sources （84 quasars, 27 BL Lac objects and 12 galaxies） and calculated the apparent velocities （βapp） for 224 components in the sources with the A-CDM model. We checked the relationships between their proper motions, redshifts,βapp and 5 GHz flux densities. Our analysis shows that the radio emission is strongly boosted by the Doppler effect. The superluminal motion and the relativistic beaming boosting effect are, to some extent, the same in active galactic nuclei.

Brightness temperature for 166 radio sources

Using the database of the University of Michigan Radio Astronomy Observatory （UMRAO） at three radio frequencies （4.8, 8 and 14.5 GHz）, we determined the short-term variability timescales for 166 radio sources. The timescales are 0.15d （2007＋777） to 176.17 d （0528-250） with an average timescale of Atobs = 17.1 4- 16.5 d for the whole sample. The timescales are used to calculate the brightness temperatures, TB. The value of log TB is in the range of log TB = 10.47 to 19.06 K. In addition, we also estimated the boosting factor for the sources. The correlation between the polarization and the Doppler factor is also discussed.

Does black hole spin play a key role in the FSRQ/BL Lac dichotomy?

Blazars are characterized by large intensity and spectral variations across the electromagnetic spectrum It is believed that jets emerging from them are almost aligned with the line-of-sight. The major- ity of identified extragalactic sources in γ-ray catalogs of EGRET and Fermi are blazars. Observationally, blazars can be divided into two classes： fiat spectrum radio quasars （FSRQs） and BL Lacs. BL Lacs usually exhibit lower γ-ray luminosity and harder power law spectra at γ-ray energies than FSRQs. We attempt to explain the high energy properties of FSRQs and BL Lacs from Fermi γ-ray space telescope observations. It was argued previously that the difference in accretion rates is mainly responsible for the large mismatch in observed luminosity in ＂7-ray. However, when intrinsic luminosities are derived by correcting for beaming effects, this difference in 7-ray luminosity between the two classes is significantly reduced. In order to ex- plain this difference in intrinsic luminosities, we propose that spin plays an important role in the luminosity distribution dichotomy of BL Lacs and FSRQs. As the outflow power of a blazar increases with increasing spin of a central black hole, we suggest that the spin plays a crucial role in making BL Lac sources low luminous and slow rotators compared to FSRQ sources.

On the emission lines in active galactic nuclei with relativistic jets

The effect of the observed continuum emitted from a relativistic jet on the measurement of the full width at half maximum （FWHM） of an emission line is analyzed. If the jet contribution is not properly subtracted, the FWHM of the line could seem narrower than it should. The cases of an emission line detected in BL Lac objects and γ-ray Narrow-Line Seyfert 1 galaxies （γ-NLS1s） are addressed. It is shown that the smallness of the observed FWHM of the Lyα lines detected in three well-known BL Lacs is an effect due to the combined action of both the relativistic jet and a weak accretion disk. Once the Doppler boosting effect of the jet continuum is removed, the intrinsic FWHM values of the lines are found to be in the usual range. By contrast, the narrow permitted lines in γ-NLS1s are really narrow, since the disk and the lines are much more powerful. This also confirms that γ-NLS1 is really a new class of γ-ray emitting AGN, different from blazars and radio galaxies.

The broadband spectral energy distributions of SDSS blazars

We compiled the radio, optical and X-ray data of blazars from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey database, and presented the distribution of luminosities and broadband spectral indices. The distribution of luminosities shows that the averaged luminosity of flat spectrum radio quasars（FSRQs） is larger than that of BL Lacertae（BL Lac） objects. On the other hand, the broadband spectral energy distribution reveals that FSRQs and low energy peaked BL Lac objects have similar spectral properties,but high energy peaked BL Lac objects have a distinct spectral property. This may be due to the fact that different subclasses of blazars have different intrinsic environments and are at different cooling levels. Even so, a unified scheme is also revealed from the color-color diagram, which hints that there are similar physical processes operating in all objects under a range of intrinsic physical conditions or beaming parameters.

What determines the observational differences of blazars？

We examine the scenario that the Doppler factor determines the observational differences of blazars. Significantly negative correlations are found between the observational synchrotron peak frequency and the Doppler factor. After correcting the Doppler boosting, the intrinsic peak frequency has a tight linear relation with the Doppler factor. It is interesting that this relation is consistent with the scenario that the black hole mass governs both the bulk Lorentz factor and the synchrotron peak frequency. In addition, the distinction between the kinetic jet powers of BL Lac objects and fiat spectrum radio quasars disappears after the boosting factor δ2 is considered. The negative correlation between the peak frequency and the observational isotropic luminosity, known as the blazar sequence, also disappears after the Doppler boosting is corrected. We also find that the correlation between the Compton dominance and the Doppler factor exists for all types of blazars. Therefore, this correlation is unsuitable for examining the external Compton emission dominance.

Properties of BL Lac Objects with Redshift ≤ 0.2

We present a large sample which includes 82 BL Lac objects with red- shifts below 0.2 from recent literature. We find strong correlations in both flux and luminosity between the radio (5 GHz) and optical bands (5500 A). The correlations in other bands are very weak. Five TeV BL Lacs and two suspect sources are found to have similar properties as high- frequency- peaked BL Lacs (HBLs). Our results suggest that both the radio and optical emissions are from the same radiation mech- anism in the SSC model. The TeV BL Lac candidates should be HBLs or HBL-like objects with small redshifts.

The spectral properties of Fermi blazars:the spectral sequence and unification of blazars

Using a large sample of blazars of the Fermi observations presented by Abdo et al., we constructed a sample of blazars including high energy peaked BL Lac objects （HBLs）, low energy peaked BL Lac objects （LBLs） and flat-spectral ra- dio quasars （FSRQs）. These unique characteristics make it possible to unambiguously address the question of how HBLs, LBLs and FSRQs are related. In this paper, we investigated the relationship between X-ray and 7-ray spectral indices （~^-aT）, as well as the relationship between the broadband spectral indices （~ro--ar~, ~ro--~ox, OZro--O^x7 and ~r^-~xT） for this sample. The color-color diagram shows that there is a significant correlation between both quantities when all three subclasses of blazars are considered, which suggests that there is a unified scheme for blazars. On the other hand, the a^-~7 diagram reveals that three kinds of blazars have different spectral energy distributions： the trend of HBLs is different from that of FSRQs and LBLs, whereas FSRQs and LBLs have a similar trend, which hints that FSRQs and LBLs have similar spectral properties, but HBLs have distinct spectral properties. In addi- tion, the broadband energy distributions also reveal the similar spectral properties with that of the Cx-C7 diagram. The spectral properties revealed from the Fermi sample do not support the blazar sequence reported by Fossati et al. and Ghisellini et al.

The redshift distribution of BL Lacs and FSRQs

Flat spectrum radio quasars(FSRQs) and BL Lacertae objects(BL Lacs) are powerful jet producing active galactic nuclei associated with supermassive black holes accreting at high and low Eddington rates, respectively. Based on the Millennium Simulation, Gardner & Done have predicted their redshift distribution by appealing to ideas from the spin paradigm in a way that exposes a need for a deeper discussion on three interrelated issues:(1) an overprediction of BL Lacs compared to FSRQs;(2) a difference in FSRQ and BL Lac distributions;(3) a need for powerful but different jets at separated cosmic times. Beginning with Gardner & Done's determination of Fermi observable FSRQs based on the distribution of thermal accretion across cosmic time from the Millennium Simulation, we connect FSRQs to BL Lacs by way of the gap paradigm for black hole accretion and jet formation to address the above issues in a unified way. We identify a physical constraint in the paradigm for the numbers of BL Lacs that naturally leads to separate peaks in time for different albeit powerful jets. In addition, we both identify as puzzling and ascribe physical significance to a tail end in the BL Lac curve versus redshift that is unseen in the redshift distribution for FSRQs.

Long-term optical color behavior of a sample of blazars

We report on the optical color variability of a sample of 24 blazars, consisting of nine flat spectrum radio quasars(FSRQs) and 15 BL Lacertae objects(BL Lacs), on timescales of years using simultaneous V-and R-band observations observed by the Kanata telescope at Higashi-Hiroshima Observatory.The correlations between color indices V-R and magnitudes reveal that 11 BL Lacs and one FSRQ exhibited significant(i.e., r > 0.2 and P < 0.01) bluer-when-brighter(BWB) trend and two FSRQs followed the redder-when-brighter(RWB) tend, indicating a possibility that the BWB chromatic trend is dominant for BL Lacs and the RWB trend is especially found in FSRQs, which has been presented occasionally in different samples of blazars.The superpositions of the red emission component from the Doppler-boosted relativistic jet and the blue component arising from the accretion disk might be a possible interpretation for the long-term color behaviors.

Explaining the Multiwavelength Emission of Hard-Te V BL Lac Objects Using a Truncated Conical Jet Model

Hard-Te V BL Lac objects are newly identified populations of active galactic nuclei with the emittedγ-ray photons well above Te V energies.In this paper,we explain the multiwavelength emission of six Hard-Te V BL Lac objects by using a truncated conical emission region of the jet,where the electron distribution is obtained by numerically solving the evolution equation along the jet self-consistently.For comparison,we also apply the model to Mrk 421and Mrk 501,which are the potential candidates for the hard Te V emissions.We demonstrate that the model can satisfactorily reproduce the spectral energy distributions of eight sources,particularly of six Hard-Te V sources,where no extreme minimum Lorentz factor of the electron population is required.In contrast with Mrk 421 and Mrk 501,six Hard-Te V sources have rather low magnetization in emitting regions and high cutoff energies of the electron distributions.

Long-term multi-wavelength variations of Fermi blazar 3C 279

Long-term optical,X-ray and γ-ray data of blazar 3 C 279 have been compiled from Swift-XRT,RXTE-PCA,Fermi-LAT,SMARTS and literature.The source exhibits strong variability on long timescales.From the 1980 s until now,the optical R band light curve spans more than 32 yr,and a possible 5.6-yr-long quasi-periodic variation component has been found in it.The optical spectral behavior has been investigated.In the optical band,the mean spectral index is –1.71.The source exhibits an obvious special spectral behavior.In the low state,the source manifests a clear bluer-when-brighter behavior in the sense that the optical spectrum turns harder(flatter) when the brightness increases.While in the high state,the optical spectrum is stable,which means the source spectral index does not vary with brightness.The correlation analysis has been performed among optical,X-ray and γ-ray energy bands.The result indicates that the variations of γ-ray and X-ray bands are well correlated without time delay on the timescale of days,and their variations exhibit weak correlations with those of the optical band.The variations,especially outbursts,are simultaneous,but the magnitude of variations is disproportionate.The detailed analysis reveals that the main outbursts exhibit strong correlations in different γ-ray,X-ray and optical bands.

Lsyn-Esyn,p-δrelation in active galactic nucleus jets and implication for the physical origin of the Lp-Ep,z-Γ_0 relation of gamma-ray bursts

High energy photon radiations of gamma-ray bursts(GRBs)and active galactic nuclei(AGNs)are dominated by their jet radiations.We examine whether the synchrotron radiations of jets in BL Lacs,flat spectrum radio quasars(FSRQs),and Narrow Line Seyfert 1 galaxies(NLS1s)follow the relation between the prompt gamma-ray emission and the initial Lorentz factor(Γ0)of GRBs.It is shown that the AGN sample does not agree with the Lp-Ep,z-Γ0 relation of GRBs.In addition,we obtain a tight relation of Lsyn∝Е0.45±0.15δ3.50±0.25 syn,p for FSRQs and NLS1 galaxies,where Lsyn is the luminosity at peak photon energy Esyn,p of the synchrotron radiations.This relation is different from the Lp-Ep,z-Γ0 relation of GRB s.The dependence of Lsyn toδis consistent with the expectation of the Doppler boosting effect for the FSRQs and NLS1 galaxies,but it is not for GRBs.We argue thatΓ0 may be a representative of the kinetic power of the radiating region and the tight Lp-Ep,z-Γ0 relation is shaped by the radiation physics and the jet power together.

Correlation between Brightness Variability and Spectral Index Variability for Fermi Blazars

In this work,theγ-ray photon flux,photon spectral index(α_(ph)),variability index(log V.I.),and the synchrotron peak frequency(log v_(p))are compiled for 851 common blazars from the 3 FGL and 4 FGL catalogs and Fan et al.to investigate variability properties for Fermi blazars.Our calculations and analyses reach following results:(1)the averaged luminosity,spectral index,and variability index of FSRQs are higher than those of BL Lacs for the whole sample.(2)It is found that the spectral index variation is closely anti-correlated with the luminosity variation implying that the spectrum becomes harder when the source becomes brighter in theγ-ray band.(3)Positive correlations are found between the photon spectral index and bothγ-ray luminosity and variability index(log V.I.)for the whole sample,but anti-correlations are found in the two correlations for FSRQs.For BL Lac subclass,there is a marginal anti-correlation between the photon spectral index and bothγ-ray luminosity,and a positive correlation between the photon spectral index and the variability index(log V.I.).We think those two positive correlations found for the whole sample are apparent.(4)We adopted the SVM machine learning method to separate BL Lacs and FSRQs in theα_(ph)versus log L_(γ)andα_(ph)versus log V.I.plots and proposed that a BCU is an FSRQ candidate if it satisfies log V.I.>-10.119 a+24.855,orα_(ph)>-0.048 log L_(γ)+4.498,otherwise,it is a BL Lac candidate.Our classification results are quite consistent with those by Kang et al(2019).

Constraining evolution of magnetic field strength in the dissipation region of two BL Lac objects

With the assumption that the optical variability timescale is dominated by the cooling time of the synchrotron process for BL Lac objects,we estimate time dependent magnetic field strength of the emission region for two BL Lac objects.The average magnetic field strengths are consistent with those estimated from core shift measurement and spectral energy distribution modelling.Variation of magnetic field strength in the dissipation region is discovered.Variability of flux and magnetic field strength shows no clear correlation,which indicates the variation of magnetic field is not the dominant reason of the variability origin.The evolution of magnetic field strength can provide another approach to constrain the energy dissipation mechanism in jets.