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INTEGRAL IBIS AGN Catalog

Metadata Updated: March 13, 2026

In this work, the authors present the most comprehensive INTEGRAL active galactic nucleus (AGN) sample. It lists 272 AGN for which they have secure optical identifications, precise optical spectroscopy and measured redshift values plus X-ray spectral information, i.e. 2-10 and 20-100 keV fluxes plus column densities. In their paper, the authors mainly use this sample to study the absorption properties of active galaxies, to probe new AGN classes and to test the AGN unification scheme. The authors find that half (48%) of the sample is absorbed, while the fraction of Compton-thick AGN is small (~7%). In line with their previous analysis, they have however shown that when the bias towards heavily absorbed objects which are lost if weak and at large distance is removed, as is possible in the local Universe, the above fractions increase to become 80% and 17%, respectively. The authors also find that absorption is a function of source luminosity, which implies some evolution in the obscuration properties of AGN. A few peculiar classes, so far poorly studied in the hard X-ray band, have been detected and studied for the first time such as 5 X-ray bright optically normal galaxies (XBONGs), 5 type 2 QSOs and 11 low-ionization nuclear emission regions. In terms of optical classification, this sample contains 57% type 1 and 43% type 2 AGN; this subdivision is similar to that found in X-rays if unabsorbed versus absorbed objects are considered, suggesting that the match between optical and X-ray classifications is on the whole good. Only a small percentage of sources (12%) does not fulfill the expectation of the unified theory as the authors find 22 type 1 AGN which are absorbed and 10 type 2 AGN which are unabsorbed. Studying in depth these outliers they found that most of the absorbed type 1 AGN have X-ray spectra characterized by either complex or warm/ionized absorption more likely due to ionized gas located in an accretion disc wind or in the bi-conical structure associated with the central nucleus, therefore unrelated to the toroidal structure. Among the 10 type 2 AGN which are unabsorbed, at most 3-4% are still eligible to be classified as 'true' type 2 AGN. In the fourth INTEGRAL/IBIS survey (Bird et al. 2010, ApJS, 186, 1, available in the HEASARC database as the IBISCAT4 table), there are 234 objects which have been identified with AGN. To this set of sources, the present authors then added 38 galaxies listed in the INTEGRAL all-sky survey by Krivonos et al. (2007, A&A, 475, 775, available in the HEASARC database as the INTIBISASS table) updated on the website (<a href="http://hea.iki.rssi.ru/integral/survey/catalog.php">http://hea.iki.rssi.ru/integral/survey/catalog.php</a>;) but not included in the Bird et al. catalog due to the different sky coverage (these latter sources are indicated with hard_flag = 'h' values in this HEASARC table). The final data set presented and discussed in the reference paper and constituting this table therefore comprises 272 AGN and was last updated in March 2011 March. It represents the most complete view of the INTEGRAL extragalactic sky as of the date of publication in 2012. This table was created by the HEASARC in October 2014 based on <a href="https://cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/ftp/cats/J/MNRAS/426/1750">CDS Catalog J/MNRAS/426/1750</a> files tablea1.dat and refs.dat. This is a service provided by NASA HEASARC .

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: See this page for license information.

Downloads & Resources

Dates

Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
Metadata Updated Date March 13, 2026

Metadata Source

Harvested from NASA Data.json

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
Metadata Updated Date March 13, 2026
Publisher High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center
Maintainer
Identifier ivo://nasa.heasarc/intibisagn
Data Last Modified 2026-03-09
Category Astrophysics
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 026:00
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id 3d7becb0-732a-44c7-8032-be2dc47eaea8
Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
Homepage URL ivo://nasa.heasarc/intibisagn
License https://www.usa.gov/government-works
Program Code 026:000
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 3017c3310b30950766816cf80cca5a2a622a39583b72977e04035c1538fb1023
Source Schema Version 1.1

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