Viewing Angle Observations and Effects of Evolution with Redshift, Black Hole Mass, and Eddington Ratio in Quasar-based Cosmology

Abstract

Abstract This study is focused on the observational measurement of the viewing angle of individual quasars by modeling the broadband quasar spectrum ranging from the IR to soft X-ray band. Sources are selected from various published catalogs, and their broadband quasi-simultaneous spectral data points were collected and used for modeling. We started with a COSMOS sample of Type-1 sources that have broadband photometric points. To include more data points, we cross-matched the COSMOS with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 14 quasar catalog, and eventually we find 90 sources which have broadband data ranging from IR to soft X-ray. The broadband spectral energy distribution modeling is done in Xspec by using the optxagnf and the SKIRTOR models for the X-ray, UV, optical, and IR regimes for each source. The whole sample is divided into four bins with respect to redshift, black hole (BH) mass, and Eddington ratio with an equal number of sources in each bin. The viewing angle is estimated in each bin, and its evolution with respect to redshift, BH mass, and Eddington ratio is examined. In result, we did not find any significant evolution of viewing angle with those parameters within the 95% confidence interval. We conclude that the use of quasars in cosmology to determine the expansion rate of the universe is therefore justified, and biases are not expected.