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Jiang-Tao Li

Publications and source records attributed to Jiang-Tao Li.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

Chandra Detection of Three X-ray Bright Quasars at z>5

We report Chandra detection of three UV bright radio quiet quasars at $z\gtrsim5$. We have collected a sufficient number of photons to extract an X-ray spectrum of each quasar to measure their basic X-ray properties, such as the X-ray flux, power law photon index ($Γ$), and optical-to-X-ray spectral slope ($α_{\rm OX}$). J074749+115352 at $z=5.26$ is the X-ray brightest radio-quiet quasar at $z>5$. It may have a short timescale variation (on a timescale of $\sim3800\rm~s$ in the observer's frame, or $\sim600\rm~s$ in the rest frame) which is however largely embedded in the statistical noise. We extract phase folded spectra of this quasar. There are two distinguishable states: a "high soft" state with an average X-ray flux $\sim2.7$ times of the "low hard" state, and a significantly steeper X-ray spectral slope ($Γ=2.40_{-0.32}^{+0.33}$ vs $1.78_{-0.24}^{+0.25}$). We also compare the three quasars detected in this paper to other quasar samples. We find that J074749+115352, with a SMBH mass of $M_{\rm SMBH}\approx1.8\times10^9\rm~M_\odot$ and an Eddington ratio of $λ_{\rm Edd}\approx2.3$, is extraordinarily X-ray bright. It has an average $α_{\rm OX}=-1.46\pm0.02$ and a 2-10 keV bolometric correction factor of $L_{\rm bol}/L_{\rm2-10keV}=42.4\pm5.8$, both significantly depart from some well defined scaling relations. We compare $Γ$ of the three quasars to other samples at different redshifts, and do not find any significant redshift evolution based on the limited sample of $z>5$ quasars with reliable measurements of the X-ray spectral properties.

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Errata on the Calculation of Hot Gas Properties in a Few Li Jiang-Tao's Papers

This is a combination of the errata of seven papers published between 2008 and 2016 with Jiang-Tao Li (JTL) as the first author. All the problems are caused by two mistakes in the original scripts written by JTL used to calculate the physical parameters of the hot gas from X-ray spectral analysis with a thermal plasma code. The mistakes will result in an overestimate of some parameters, such as the electron number density and hot gas mass by a factor of $\sqrt{10}\approx3.162$, and an overestimate of the thermal pressure by a factor of $\approx2.725$. JTL apologizes to the community for the inconvenience caused by these mistakes. We present an update on the text, numbers, figures, and tables of all the seven papers affected by these mistakes. Other papers led by JTL or co-authored papers are not affected.

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Pōniuā'ena: A Luminous $z=7.5$ Quasar Hosting a 1.5 Billion Solar Mass Black Hole

We report the discovery of a luminous quasar, J1007+2115 at $z=7.515$ ("Pōniuā'ena"), from our wide-field reionization-era quasar survey. J1007+2115 is the second quasar now known at $z>7.5$, deep into the reionization epoch. The quasar is powered by a $(1.5\pm0.2)\times10^9$ $M_{\odot}$ supermassive black hole (SMBH), based on its broad MgII emission-line profile from Gemini and Keck near-IR spectroscopy. The SMBH in J1007+2115 is twice as massive as that in quasar J1342+0928 at $z=7.54$, the current quasar redshift record holder. The existence of such a massive SMBH just 700 million years after the Big Bang significantly challenges models of the earliest SMBH growth. Model assumptions of Eddington-limited accretion and a radiative efficiency of 0.1 require a seed black hole of $\gtrsim 10^{4}$ $M_{\odot}$ at $z=30$. This requirement suggests either a massive black hole seed as a result of direct collapse or earlier periods of rapid black hole growth with hyper-Eddington accretion and/or a low radiative efficiency. We measure the damping wing signature imprinted by neutral hydrogen absorption in the intergalactic medium (IGM) on J1007+2115's Ly$α$ line profile, and find that it is weaker than that of J1342+0928 and two other $z\gtrsim7$ quasars. We estimate an IGM volume-averaged neutral fraction $\langle x\rm_{HI}\rangle=0.39^{+0.22}_{-0.13}$. This range of values suggests a patchy reionization history toward different IGM sightlines. We detect the 158 $μ$m [C II] emission line in J1007+2115 with ALMA; this line centroid yields a systemic redshift of $z=7.5149\pm0.0004$ and indicates a star formation rate of $\sim210$ $M_{\odot}$ yr$^{-1}$ in its host galaxy.

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CHANG-ES XXII: Coherent Magnetic Fields in the Halos of Spiral Galaxies

Context. The magnetic field in spiral galaxies is known to have a large-scale spiral structure along the galactic disk and is observed as X-shaped in the halo of some galaxies. While the disk field can be well explained by dynamo action, the 3-dimensional structure of the halo field and its physical nature is still unclear. Aims. As first steps towards understanding the halo fields, we want to clarify whether the observed X-shaped field is a wide-spread pattern in the halos of spiral galaxies and whether these halo fields are just turbulent fields ordered by compression or shear (anisotropic turbulent fields), or have a large-scale regular structure. Methods. The analysis of the Faraday rotation in the halo is the tool to discern anisotropic turbulent fields from large-scale magnetic fields. This, however, has been challenging until recently because of the faint halo emission in linear polarization. Our sensitive VLA broadband observations C-band and L-band of 35 spiral galaxies seen edge-on (called CHANG-ES) allowed us to perform RM-synthesis in their halos and to analyze the results. We further accomplished a stacking of the observed polarization maps of 28 CHANG-ES galaxies at C-band. Results. Though the stacked edge-on galaxies were of different Hubble types, star formation and interaction activities, the stacked image clearly reveals an X-shaped structure of the apparent magnetic field. We detected a large-scale (coherent) halo field in all 16 galaxies that have extended polarized intensity in their halos. We detected large-scale field reversals in all of their halos. In six galaxies they are along lines about vertical to the galactic midplane (vertical RMTL) with about 2 kpc separation. Only in NGC 3044 and possibly in NGC 3448 we observed vertical giant magnetic ropes (GMRs) similar to those detected recently in NGC 4631.

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An X-ray View of the Hot Circum-Galactic Medium

The hot circum-galactic medium (CGM) represents the hot gas distributed beyond the stellar content of the galaxies while typically within their dark matter halos. It serves as a depository of energy and metal-enriched materials from galactic feedback and a reservoir from which the galaxy acquires fuels to form stars. It thus plays a critical role in the coevolution of galaxies and their environments. X-rays are one of the best ways to trace the hot CGM. I will briefly review what we have learned about the hot CGM based on X-ray observations over the past two decades, and what we still do not know. I will also briefly prospect what may be the foreseeable breakthrough in the next one or two decades with future X-ray missions.

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The Warm Gas in the MW: A Kinematical Model

We develop a kinematical model for the Milky Way Si IV-bearing gas to determine its density distribution and kinematics. This model is constrained by a column density line shape sample extracted from the {\it HST}/COS archival data, which contains 186 AGN sight lines. We find that the Si IV ion density distribution is dominated by an extended disk along the $z$-direction (above or below the midplane), i.e., $n(z)=n_0\exp(-(z/z_0)^{0.82})$, where $z_0$ is the scale height of $6.3_{-1.5}^{+1.6}$ kpc (northern hemisphere) and $3.6_{-0.9}^{+1.0}$ kpc (southern hemisphere). The density distribution of the disk in the radial direction shows a sharp edge at $15-20$ kpc given by, $n(r_{\rm XY})=n_0\exp(-(r_{\rm XY}/r_0)^{3.36})$, where $r_0 \approx 12.5\pm0.6$ kpc. The difference of density distributions over $r_{\rm XY}$ and $z$ directions indicates that the warm gas traced by \ion{Si}{4} is mainly associated with disk processes (e.g., feedback or cycling gas) rather than accretion. We estimate the mass of the warm gas (within 50 kpc) is $\log (M(50 {\rm kpc})/M_\odot)\approx8.1$ (assuming $Z\approx0.5Z_\odot$), and a $3σ$ upper limit of $\log (M(250 {\rm kpc})/M_\odot)\approx9.1$ (excluding the Magellanic system). Kinematically, the warm gas disk is nearly co-rotating with the stellar disk at $v_{\rm rot}=215\pm3\rm~km~s^{-1}$, which lags the midplane rotation by about $8\rm~km~s^{-1}~kpc^{-1}$ (within 5 kpc). Meanwhile, we note that the warm gas in the northern hemisphere has significant accretion with $v_{\rm acc}$ of $69\pm 7\rm ~km~s^{-1}$ at 10 kpc (an accretion rate of $-0.60_{-0.13}^{+0.11}~M_\odot\rm~yr^{-1}$), while in the southern hemisphere, there is no measurable accretion, with an upper limit of $0.4~M_\odot\rm~yr^{-1}$.

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CHANG-ES XVI: An in-depth view of the cosmic-ray transport in the edge-on spiral galaxies NGC 891 and NGC 4565

Cosmic-ray electrons (CREs) originating from the star-forming discs of spiral galaxies frequently form extended radio haloes that are best observable in edge-on galaxies. For the present study we selected two nearby edge-on galaxies from the CHANG-ES survey, NGC 891 and 4565, which differ largely in halo size and SFR. To figure out how such differences are related to the CRE transport in disc and halo, we use wide-band 1.5 and 6 GHz VLA observations obtained in the B, C, and D configurations, and combine the 6 GHz images with Effelsberg observations to correct for missing short spacings. We study the spatially resolved non-thermal spectral index distribution in terms of CRE spectral ageing, compute total magnetic field strengths assuming energy equipartition between CRs and magnetic fields, and also determine synchrotron scale heights. Based on the vertical profiles of synchrotron intensity and spectral index, we create purely advective and purely diffusive CRE transport models by numerically solving the 1D diffusion-loss equation. In particular, we investigate for the first time the radial dependence of synchrotron and magnetic field scale heights, advection speeds and diffusion coefficients in these two galaxies. We find the spectral index distribution of NGC 891 to be mostly consistent with continuous CRE injection, while in NGC 4565 the local synchrotron spectra are more in line with discrete-epoch CRE injection (JP or KP models). This implies that CRE injection timescales are lower than the synchrotron cooling timescales. The scale height of NGC 891 increases with radius, indicating that synchrotron losses are significant. NGC 891 is probably dominated by advective CRE transport at a velocity of $\gtrsim150\,\mathrm{km\,s^{-1}}$. In contrast, NGC 4565 is diffusion-dominated up to $z=1$ kpc or higher, with a diffusion coefficient of $\geq2\times10^{28}\,\mathrm{cm^2\,s^{-1}}$.

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CHANG-ES XVII: H-alpha Imaging of Nearby Edge-on Galaxies, New SFRs, and an Extreme Star Formation Region -- Data Release 2

We present new narrow-band H-alpha imaging for 24 nearby edge-on galaxies in the CHANG-ES survey. We use the images in conjunction with WISE 22 micron imaging of the sample to estimate improved star formation rates (SFRs) using the updated recipe from Vargas et al. (2018). We explore correlations between the updated star formation properties and radio continuum scale heights, scale lengths, and diameters, measured in Krause et al. (2018). We find a newly discovered correlation between SFR and radio scale height that did not exist using mid-IR only SFR calibrations. This implies that a mid-IR extinction correction should be applied to SFR calibrations when used in edge-on galaxies, due to attenuation by dust. The updated SFR values also show newly discovered correlations with radio scale length and radio diameter, implying that the previously-measured relationship between radio scale height and radio diameter originates from star formation within the disk. We also identify a region of star formation located at extreme distance from the disk of NGC 4157, possibly ionized by a single O5.5 V star. This region is spatially coincident with an XUV disk feature, as traced by GALEX NUV imaging. We theorize that the star formation feature arose due to gravitational instability within gas from an accretion event. New H-alpha images from this work can be found at the CHANG-ES data release web site, https://www.queensu.ca/changes.

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Molecular Gas of the Most Massive Spiral Galaxies I: a Case Study of NGC 5908

We present IRAM 30m observations of molecular lines of CO and its isotopologues from the massive spiral galaxy NGC 5908 selected from the CGM-MASS sample. $^{12}$CO $J=1-0$, $^{12}$CO $J=2-1$, and $^{13}$CO $J=1-0$ lines have been detected in most of the positions along the galactic disk. The total molecular gas mass of NGC 5908 is $\sim7\times10^9\rm~M_\odot$ and the total cool gas mass adding atomic hydrogen is $\sim1.3\times10^{10}\rm~M_\odot$, comparable to the upper limit of the mass of the X-ray emitting hot gas in the halo. Modeling the rotation curves constructed with all three CO lines indicates that NGC 5908 has a dark matter halo mass of $M_{\rm vir}\sim10^{13}\rm~M_{\rm \odot}$, putting it among the most massive isolated spiral galaxies. The $^{12}$CO/$^{13}$CO $J=1-0$, $^{12}$CO $J=2-1$/$J=1-0$ line ratios and the estimated molecular gas temperature all indicate normal but non-negligible star formation in this fairly gas-rich massive isolated spiral galaxy, consistent with the measured star formation intensity and surface densities. The galaxy is probably at an early evolutionary stage after a fast growth stage with mergers and/or starbursts, with plenty of leftover cool gas, relatively high SFR, low hot CGM cooling rate, and low X-ray emissivity.

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Detection of non-thermal hard X-ray emission from the "Fermi bubble" in an external galaxy

We report new Chandra hard X-ray ($>2\rm~keV$) and JVLA C-band observations of the nuclear superbubble of NGC 3079, an analog of the "Fermi bubble" in our Milky Way. We detect extended hard X-ray emission on the SW side of the galactic nucleus with coherent multi-wavelength features in radio, H$α$, and soft X-ray. The hard X-ray feature has a cone shape with possibly a weak cap, forming a bubble-like structure with a diameter of $\sim1.1\rm~kpc$. A similar extended feature, however, is not detected on the NE side, which is brighter in all other wavelengths such as radio, H$α$, and soft X-ray. Scattered photons from the nuclear region or other nearby point-like X-ray bright sources, inverse Compton emission from cosmic ray electrons via interaction with the cosmic microwave background, or any individually faint stellar X-ray source populations, cannot explain the extended hard X-ray emission on the SW side and the strongly NE/SW asymmetry. A synchrotron emission model, plus a thermal component accounting for the excess at $\sim1\rm~keV$, can well characterize the broadband radio/hard X-ray spectra. The broadband synchrotron spectra do not show any significant cutoff, and even possibly slightly flatten at higher energy. This rules out a loss-limited scenario in the acceleration of the cosmic ray electrons in or around this superbubble. As the first detection of kpc-scale extended hard X-ray emission associated with a galactic nuclear superbubble, the spatial and spectral properties of the multi-wavelength emissions indicate that the cosmic ray leptons responsible for the broad-band synchrotron emission from the SW bubble must be accelerated in situ, instead of transported from the nuclear region of the galaxy.

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The Discovery of A Luminous Broad Absorption Line Quasar at A Redshift of 7.02

Despite extensive efforts, only two quasars have been found at $z>7$ to date due to a combination of low spatial density and high contamination from more ubiquitous Galactic cool dwarfs in quasar selection. This limits our current knowledge of the super-massive black hole (SMBH) growth mechanism and reionization history. In this letter, we report the discovery of a luminous quasar at $z=7.021$, DELS J003836.10$-$152723.6 (hereafter J0038$-$1527), selected using photometric data from DESI Legacy imaging Survey (DELS), Pan-STARRS1 (PS1) imaging Survey, as well as Wide-field Infrared Survey Explore ($WISE$) mid-infrared all-sky survey. With an absolute magnitude of $M_{1450}$=$-$27.1 and bolometric luminosity of $L_{\rm Bol}$=5.6$\times$10$^{13}$ $L_\odot$, J0038$-$1527 is the most luminous quasar known at $z>7$. Deep optical to near infrared spectroscopic observations suggest that J0038-1527 hosts a 1.3 billion solar mass BH accreting at the Eddington limit, with an Eddington ratio of 1.25$\pm$0.19. The CIV broad emission line of J0038$-$1527 is blue-shifted by more than 3000 km s$^{-1}$ to the systemic redshift. More detailed investigations of the high quality spectra reveal three extremely high velocity CIV broad absorption lines (BALs) with velocity from 0.08 to 0.14 times the speed of light and total balnicity index of more than 5000 km s$^{-1}$, suggesting the presence of relativistic outflows. J0038$-$1527 is the first quasar found at the epoch of reionization (EoR) with such strong outflows and provides a unique laboratory to investigate AGN feedback on the formation and growth of the most massive galaxies in the early universe.

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Exploring Reionization-Era Quasars III: Discovery of 16 Quasars at $6.4\lesssim z \lesssim 6.9$ with DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys and UKIRT Hemisphere Survey and Quasar Luminosity Function at $z\sim6.7$

This is the third paper in a series aims at finding reionzation-era quasars with the combination of DESI Legacy imaging Surveys (DELS) and near-infrared imaging surveys, such as the UKIRT Hemisphere Survey (UHS), as well as the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explore ($WISE$) mid-infrared survey. In this paper, we describe the updated quasar candidate selection procedure, report the discovery of 16 quasars at $6.4\lesssim z \lesssim6.9$ from area of $\sim$13,020 deg$^2$, and present the quasar luminosity function (QLF) at $z\sim6.7$. The measured QLF follows $Φ(L_{1450})\propto L_{1450}^{-2.35}$ in the magnitude range $27.6<M_{1450}<-25.5$. We determine the quasar comoving spatial density at $\langle z \rangle$=6.7 and $M_{1450}<-26.0$ to be $\rm 0.39\pm0.11 Gpc^{-3}$ and find that the exponential density evolution parameter to be $k=-0.78\pm0.18$ from $z\sim6$ to $z\sim6.7$, corresponding to a rapid decline by a factor of $\sim 6$ per unit redshift towards earlier epoch, a rate significantly faster than that at $z\sim 3- 5$. The cosmic time between $z\sim6$ and $z\sim6.7$ is only 121 Myrs. The quasar density declined by a factor of more than three within such short time requires that SMBHs must grow rapidly or they are less radiatively efficient at higher redshifts. We measured quasar comoving emissivity at $z\sim6.7$ which indicate that high redshift quasars are highly unlikely to make a significant contribution to hydrogen reionization. The broad absorption line (BAL) quasar fraction at $z\gtrsim6.5$ is measured to be $\gtrsim$22%. In addition, we also report the discovery of additional five quasars at $z\sim6$ in the appendix.

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Molecular gas toward supernova remnant Cassiopeia A

We mapped 12CO J=1-0, 12CO J=2-1, 13CO J=1-0, and 13CO J=2-1 lines toward supernova remnant (SNR) Cassiopeia A with the IRAM 30m telescope. The molecular clouds (MCs) along the line of sight of Cas A do not show optically thin, shock-broadened 12CO lines ($ΔV \le 7$ km s$^{-1}$ toward Cas A), or high-temperature features from shock heating ($T_k \le 22$ K toward Cas A). Therefore, we suggest that there is no physical evidence to support that the SNR is impacting the molecular gas. All the detected MCs are likely in front of Cas A, as implied by the HCO+ absorption line detected in the same velocity ranges. These MCs contribute H$_2$ column densities of $5\times 10^{21}$ cm$^{-2}$, $5\times 10^{21}$ cm$^{-2}$, and $2\times 10^{21}$ cm$^{-2}$ in the west, south, and center of the SNR, respectively. The 20 K warm gas at $V_{LSR}\sim -47$ km s$^{-1}$ is distributed along a large-scale molecular ridge in the south of Cas A. Part of the gas is projected onto Cas A, providing a foreground H$_2$ mass of $\sim 200 (d/3 kpc)^2$ Msun, consistent with the mass of cold dust (15--20 K; 2--4 Msun) found in front of the SNR. We suggest that the 20 K warm gas is heated by background cosmic rays with an ionization rate of $ζ({\rm H_2})\sim 2\times 10^{-16}$ s$^{-1}$. The cosmic rays or X-ray emission from Cas A are excluded as the heating sources of the clouds.

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Spatially resolved broad-band synchrotron emission from the non-thermal limbs of SN1006

We present ~400ks NuSTAR observations of the northeast (NE) and southwest (SW) non-thermal limbs of the Galactic SNR SN1006. We discovered three sources with X-ray emission detected at >50keV. Two of them are identified as background AGN. We extract the NuSTAR spectra from a few regions along the non-thermal limbs and jointly analyze them with the XMM-Newton spectra and the radio data. The broad-band radio/X-ray spectra can be well described with a synchrotron emission model from a single population of CR electrons with a power law energy distribution and an exponential cutoff. The power law index of the electron particle distribution function (PDF) is ~1.88-1.95 for both the NE and SW limbs, and we do not find significant evidence for a variation of this index at different energy (curvature). There are significant spatial variations of the synchrotron emission parameters. The highest energy electrons are accelerated in regions with the lowest expansion velocity, which is opposite to what has been found in the Tycho's SNR. In addition to a gradual steepening of synchrotron emission from the center of the non-thermal limbs to larger azimuthal angles, we also find that both the emission spectrum and the PDF are significantly flatter in three regions in the SW limb where the shock encounters higher density ambient medium. The NE limb also shows significantly higher cutoff energy in the PDF than the SW limb. By comparing with the roughly symmetric TeV emission and largely asymmetric GeV emission from the two non-thermal limbs, we conclude that the asymmetry in the ambient medium and magnetic fields may have largely modified the acceleration and emission of CR leptons.

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The Extended Distribution of Baryons Around Galaxies

We summarize and reanalyze observations bearing upon missing galactic baryons, where we propose a consistent picture for halo gas in L >~ L* galaxies. The hot X-ray emitting halos are detected to 50-70 kpc, where typically, M_hot(<50 kpc) ~ 5E9 Msun, and with density n \propto r^-3/2. When extrapolated to R200, the gas mass is comparable to the stellar mass, but about half of the baryons are still missing from the hot phase. If extrapolated to 1.9-3 R200, the baryon to dark matter ratio approaches the cosmic value. Significantly flatter density profiles are unlikely for R < 50 kpc and they are disfavored but not ruled out for R > 50 kpc. For the Milky Way, the hot halo metallicity lies in the range 0.3-1 solar for R < 50 kpc. Planck measurements of the thermal Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect toward stacked luminous galaxies (primarily early-type) indicate that most of their baryons are hot, near the virial temperature, and extend beyond R200. This stacked SZ signal is nearly an order of magnitude larger than that inferred from the X-ray observations of individual (mostly spiral) galaxies with M_* > 10^11.3 Msun. This difference suggests that the hot halo properties are distinct for early and late type galaxies, possibly due to different evolutionary histories. For the cooler gas detected in UV absorption line studies, we argue that there are two absorption populations: extended halos; and disks extending to ~50 kpc, containing most of this gas, and with masses a few times lower than the stellar masses. Such extended disks are also seen in 21 cm HI observations and in simulations.

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Baryon Budget of the Hot Circumgalactic Medium of Massive Spiral Galaxies

The baryon content around local galaxies is observed to be much less than is needed in Big Bang nucleosynthesis. Simulations indicate that a significant fraction of these "missing baryons" may be stored in a hot tenuous circum-galactic medium (CGM) around massive galaxies extending to or even beyond the virial radius of their dark matter halos. Previous observations in X-ray and Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (SZ) signal claimed that $\sim(1-50)\%$ of the expected baryons are stored in a hot CGM within the virial radius. The large scatter is mainly caused by the very uncertain extrapolation of the hot gas density profile based on the detection in a small radial range (typically within 10\%-20\% of the virial radius). Here we report stacking X-ray observations of six local isolated massive spiral galaxies from the CGM-MASS sample. We find that the mean density profile can be characterized by a single power law out to a galactocentric radius of $\approx 200\rm~kpc$ (or $\approx130\rm~kpc$ above the 1~$σ$ background uncertainty), about half the virial radius of the dark matter halo. We can now estimate that the hot CGM within the virial radius accounts for $(8\pm4)\%$ of the baryonic mass expected for the halos. Including the stars, the baryon fraction is $(27\pm16)\%$, or $(39\pm20)\%$ by assuming a flattened density profile at $r\gtrsim130\rm~kpc$. We conclude that the hot baryons within the virial radius of massive galaxy halos are insufficient to explain the "missing baryons".

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CHANG-ES XI: Circular Polarization in the Cores of Nearby Galaxies

We detect 5 galaxies in the CHANG-ES (Continuum Halos in Nearby Galaxies -- an EVLA Survey) sample that show circular polarization (CP) at L-band in our high resolution data sets. Two of the galaxies (NGC~4388 and NGC~4845) show strong Stokes $V/I\,\equiv\,m_C\,\sim\,2$\%, two (NGC~660 and NGC~3628) have values of $m_C\sim \,0.3$\%, and NGC~3079 is a marginal detection at $m_C\sim \,0.2$\%. The two strongest $m_C$ galaxies also have the most luminous X-ray cores and the strongest internal absorption in X-rays. We have expanded on our previous Faraday conversion interpretation and analysis and provide analytical expressions for the expected $V$ signal for a general case in which the cosmic ray electron energy spectral index can take on any value. We provide examples as to how such expressions could be used to estimate magnetic field strengths and the lower energy cutoff for CR electrons. Four out of our detections are {\it resolved}, showing unique structures, including a {\it jet} in NGC~4388 and a CP `conversion disk' in NGC~4845. The conversion disk is inclined to the galactic disk but is perpendicular to a possible outflow direction. Such CP structures have never before been seen in any galaxy to our knowledge. None of the galaxy cores show linear polarization at L-band. Thus CP may provide a unique probe of physical conditions deep into radio AGNs.

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CHANG-ES IX: Radio scale heights and scale lengths of a consistent sample of 13 spiral galaxies seen edge-on and their correlations

The vertical halo scale height is a crucial parameter to understand the transport of cosmic-ray electrons (CRE) and their energy loss mechanisms in spiral galaxies. Until now, the radio scale height could only be determined for a few edge-on galaxies because of missing sensitivity at high resolution. We developed a sophisticated method for the scale height determination of edge-on galaxies. With this we determined the scale heights and radial scale lengths for a sample of 13 galaxies from the CHANG-ES radio continuum survey in two frequency bands. The sample average value for the radio scale heights of the halo are 1.1 +/- 0.3kpc in C-band and 1.4 +/- 0.7kpc in L-band. From the frequency dependence analysis of the halo scale heights we found that the wind velocities (estimated using the adiabatic loss time) are above the escape velocity. We found that the halo scale heights increase linearly with the radio diameters. In order to exclude the diameter dependence, we defined a normalized scale height which is quite similar for all sample galaxies at both frequency bands and does not depend on the star formation rate or the magnetic field strength. However, the normalized scale height shows a tight anticorrelation with the mass surface density. The sample galaxies with smaller scale lengths are more spherical in the radio emission, while those with larger scale lengths are flatter. The radio scale height depends mainly on the radio diameter of the galaxy. The sample galaxies are consistent with an escape-dominated radio halo with convective cosmic ray propagation, indicating that galactic winds are a widespread phenomenon in spiral galaxies. While a higher star formation rate or star formation surface density does not lead to a higher wind velocity, we deceleration of CRE outflow, e.g. a lowering of the wind velocity from the galactic disk.

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