The Mid-Infrared Properties of X-ray Sources

Abstract

We combine the results of the Spitzer IRAC Shallow Survey and the Chandra XBootes Survey of the 8.5 square degrees Bootes field of the NOAO Deep Wide- Field Survey to produce the largest comparison of mid-IR and X-ray sources to date. The comparison is limited to sources with X-ray fluxes >8x10-15 erg cm-2s-1 in the 0.5-7.0 keV range and mid-IR sources with 3.6 um fluxes brighter than 18.4 mag (12.3 uJy). In this most sensitive IRAC band, 85% of the 3086 X-ray sources have mid-IR counterparts at an 80% confidence level based on a Bayesian matching technique. Only 2.5% of the sample have no IRAC counterpart at all based on visual inspection. Even for a smaller but a significantly deeper Chandra survey in the same field, the IRAC Shallow Survey recovers most of the X-ray sources. A majority (65%) of the Chandra sources detected in all four IRAC bands occupy a well-defined region of IRAC [3.6] - [4.5] vs [5.8] - [8.0] color-color space. These X-ray sources are likely infrared luminous, unobscured type I AGN with little mid-infrared flux contributed by the AGN host galaxy. Of the remaining Chandra sources, most are lower luminosity type I and type II AGN whose mid-IR emission is dominated by the host galaxy, while approximately 5% are either Galactic stars or very local galaxies.