Radio-Near Infrared Imaging of Dual Active Galactic Nuclei Candidates

We report the results of a pilot study that searched for dual active galactic nuclei (AGN) in local ($z<$0.25) galaxies hosting double-peaked narrow emission lines in their optical spectra. We present high-resolution $L-$band (1.5 GHz or 18 cm) continuum images from the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) as well as WFC3/IR F160W images from the Hubble Space Telescope of two candidate dual AGN systems: J0948+6848 and J1223+5409. In both targets, we detected compact non-thermal radio emission that is approximately co-spatial with the near-infrared AGN. Both systems host two high brightness temperature ($>10^{8}$ K) radio sources that indicate the presence of either a parsec-scale-separation dual AGN ($d_{\text{sep}} \sim 90$ pc and $\sim 56$ pc, respectively) or a radio jet. Matched-resolution multi-band radio observations are necessary to further characterize the AGN activity in these systems.

💡 Research Summary

This paper presents a pilot investigation aimed at confirming dual active galactic nucleus (AGN) candidates using high‑resolution radio and near‑infrared (NIR) imaging. The authors begin by selecting two low‑redshift (z < 0.25) galaxies, J0948+6848 (z = 0.202) and J1223+5409 (z = 0.156), from a parent sample of 1,271 SDSS DR7 quasars. The selection pipeline required (i) the presence of double‑peaked