Monitoring the Violent Activity from the Inner Accretion Disk of the Seyfert 1.9 Galaxy NGC 2992 with RXTE

Abstract

We present the results of a 1 year monitoring campaign of the Seyfert1.9 galaxy NGC 2992 with RXTE. Historically, the source has been shownto vary dramatically in 2-10 keV flux over timescales of years and wasthought to be slowly transitioning between periods of quiescence andactive accretion. Our results show that in 1 year the source continuumflux covered almost the entire historical range, making it unlikely thatthe low-luminosity states correspond to the accretion mechanismswitching off. During flaring episodes we found that a highly redshiftedFe K line appears, implying that the violent activity is occurring inthe inner accretion disk, within ~100 gravitational radii of the centralblack hole. We also found that the spectral index of the X-ray continuumremained approximately constant during the large amplitude variability.These observations make NGC 2992 well-suited for future multiwavebandmonitoring, as a test bed for constraining accretion models.