Changing-look Active Galactic Nuclei from SDSS, LAMOST and DESI Surveys
astro-ph.GA
Submitted: 2026-05-23
Updated: 2026-08-18
Comments: 11 pages, 5 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics
Journal ref: A&A, 714, A157 (2026)
DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/202661767
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
The gist: Results.
Terminology
Abstract
Results. We identify 45 CLAGNs, of which 40 are newly reported. The sample is dominated by turn-off events, comprising 43 turn-off and 2 turn-on sources. This may be because Type 2 AGNs either lack a detectable broad-line region or have their broad emission lines obscured by circumnuclear dust, making turn-on events more difficult to identify. Using DESI spectra as a third spectroscopic epoch, we identified 12 RCLAGNs. Of the 14 newly identified CLAGNs with three-epoch spectroscopic coverage, 7 objects, i.e. 50%, are confirmed as RCLAGNs. In the previously reported sample, 5 out of 16 objects with available DESI spectra, corresponding to 31%, exhibit repeating CL behaviour. The relatively high incidence of repeated CL behaviour suggests that CL transitions are associated with recurrent physical processes, such as accretion-rate fluctuations or accretion-disk instabilities. In the logM BH--log(L bol/L Edd) plane, the RCLAGNs display a clear high--low--high accretion-state evolution, indicating a close connection between repeated CL behaviour and recurrent variations in accretion power. The rest-frame upper limits on the transition timescales are 10 yr for the first transition and 4 yr for the second transition.
Sources
- The DESI Experiment Part I: Science,Targeting, and Survey Design
- The DESI Experiment Part II: Instrument Design
- The DESI Experiment, a whitepaper for Snowmass 2013
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