Radio Structures of Seyfert Galaxies. VIII. A Distance and Magnitude Limited Sample of Early-Type Galaxies

Abstract

The VLA has been used at 3.6 and 20 cm to image a sample of about 50 early-type Seyfert galaxies with recessional velocities less than 7,000 km/s and total visual magnitude less than 14.5. The nuclear radio structures of Seyfert 2.0's in the early-type sample tend to be aligned with the [OIII] and Halpha+[NII] structures even though the radio extents are smaller than the [OIII] and Halpha+[NII] extents by a factor of ~2->5. This alignment, previously known for individual Seyferts with `linear' radio sources, is here shown to be characteristic of early-type Seyfert galaxies as a class. Seyfert 2.0's in the early-type sample also show a significant alignment between the emission-line ([OIII] and Halpha+[NII]) axes and the major axis of the host galaxy. These alignments are consistent with a picture in which the ionized gas represents ambient gas predominantly co-planar with the galaxy stellar disk. This ambient gas is ionized by nuclear radiation that may escape preferentially along and around the radio axis, and is compressed in shocks driven by the radio ejecta. We use this alignment to constrain the product of the velocity of the radio ejecta and the period of any large angle precession of the inner accretion disk and jet : V_ejecta x P >= 2 kpc. An investigation of a larger sample of Seyferts reveals the unexpected result that the Seyfert 1's with the largest radio extent (>= 1.5 kpc) are all of type Seyfert 1.2. It appears that classification as this type of intermediate Seyfert depends on some factor other than the relative orientation of the nuclear obscuring torus to the line of sight.