Radio-AGN feedback: When the little ones were monsters

Abstract

We present a study of the evolution of the fraction of radio-loud active galactic nuclei (AGN) as a function of their host stellar mass. We make use of two samples of radio galaxies: one in the local Universe, 0.01 < z ≤ 0.3, using a combined SDSS-NVSS (Sloan Digital Sky Survey NRAO Very Large Array Sky Survey) sample and the other at higher redshifts, 0.5 < 1010.75 M⊙) which host radio-loud AGN with radio powers P1.4 GHz > 1024 W Hz-1 at z ~ 1-2 while the radio-loud fraction for higher mass galaxies (M* > 1011.25 M⊙) remains the same. We argue that this increase is driven largely by the increase in cold or radiative mode accretion with increasing cold gas supply at earlier epochs. The increasing population of low-mass radio-loud AGN can thus explain the upturn in the radio luminosity function at high redshift which is important for understanding the impact of AGN feedback in galaxy evolution.