Abstract
It is shown here that the environments of radio-loud quasars have a strong effect on the optical evolution of the quasars. Quasars in rich clusters of galaxies are found to fade at least four optical magnitudes between redshifts 0.65 and 0.3, corresponding to a statistical e-folding fading time of about 1.0 Gyr. This rapid decrease in quasar activity is about four times as fast as quasars in poor environments. Several physical mechanisms of this evolution are suggested, emphasizing dynamical evolution of the cluster core and evolution in the amount of gaseous fuel in the cluster environment. The environments of radio-loud and radio-quiet quasars are shown to be significantly different. Radio-quiet quasars are much less frequently situated in galaxy clusters as rich as Abell class I. This result is consistent with scenarios linking radio-loud quasars with elliptical host galaxies and radio-quiet quasars with spiral host galaxies. 49 refs.
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