Decomposition of disk and jet optical emission: Case of PKS~1510-089 and PKS~0736+017
Abstract
Measuring BLR size and black hole mass of jetted quasars with strong radio emission is challenging due to the contribution from non-thermal synchrotron radiation from the jet in the optical continuum. Here, we investigate the optical continuum emission in two flat-spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs), PKS~0736+017 and PKS~1510-089, by separating the thermal emission from the accretion disk and the non-thermal synchrotron emission from the jet using their distinct polarization signatures. Our analysis combines multi-epoch optical spectro-photometric and polarimetric observations from the archival optical continuum, Hβ emission line light curves from earlier reverberation mapping campaigns, and 37 GHz radio data. For PKS~0736+017, we find that the disk contributes approximately 70 % (fd = 0.70+0.01−0.01) of the total optical emission. After removing the jet component, we obtain a revised Hβ lag of 84.8+23.2−18.4 days. In contrast, the disk contribution in PKS~1510-089 is lower with 37.5 % (fd = 0.37+0.01−0.01), with a corresponding Hβ lag of 54.4+4.4−5.4 days. Our findings highlight the need for careful decomposition of optical light curves in jet-dominated AGN.
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BibTeX
@misc{pandey2026decomposition,
title = {{Decomposition of disk and jet optical emission: Case of PKS~1510-089 and PKS~0736+017}},
author = {Shivangi Pandey and Suvendu Rakshit and Adarsh Kumar and Anne Lähteenmäki and Merja Tornikoski and Archana Gupta},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2611.03006},
eprint = {2611.03006},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.03006},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Decomposition of disk and jet optical emission: Case of PKS~1510-089 and PKS~0736+017
AU - Shivangi Pandey
AU - Suvendu Rakshit
AU - Adarsh Kumar
AU - Anne Lähteenmäki
AU - Merja Tornikoski
AU - Archana Gupta
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/02
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2611.03006
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.03006
AB - Measuring BLR size and black hole mass of jetted quasars with strong radio emission is challenging due to the contribution from non-thermal synchrotron radiation from the jet in the optical continuum. Here, we investigate the optical continuum emission in two flat-spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs), PKS~0736+017 and PKS~1510-089, by separating the thermal emission from the accretion disk and the non-thermal synchrotron emission from the jet using their distinct polarization signatures. Our analysis combines multi-epoch optical spectro-photometric and polarimetric observations from the archival optical continuum, Hβ emission line light curves from earlier reverberation mapping campaigns, and 37 GHz radio data. For PKS~0736+017, we find that the disk contributes approximately 70 % (f_d = 0.70^+0.01_−0.01) of the total optical emission. After removing the jet component, we obtain a revised Hβ lag of 84.8^+23.2_−18.4 days. In contrast, the disk contribution in PKS~1510-089 is lower with 37.5 % (f_d = 0.37^+0.01_−0.01), with a corresponding Hβ lag of 54.4^+4.4_−5.4 days. Our findings highlight the need for careful decomposition of optical light curves in jet-dominated AGN.
ER -