Letter to the Editor

3C 273 host galaxy with Hubble Space Telescope coronagraphy^⋆

¹ Université Côte d’Azur, Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur, CNRS, Laboratoire Lagrange, Bd de l’Observatoire, CS 34229, 06304 Nice cedex 4, France
e-mail: bin.ren@oca.eu
² Université Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, Institut de Planétologie et d’Astrophysique (IPAG), 38000 Grenoble, France
³ Department of Astronomy, California Institute of Technology, MC 249-17, 1200 E California Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA
⁴ Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Johns Hopkins University, 3701 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
⁵ Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics, The Johns Hopkins University, 3400 N Charles St, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
⁶ NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA 94035, USA
e-mail: kevin.w.fogarty@nasa.gov
⁷ Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore, MD 21218, USA
⁸ Department of Physics, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, MD 21250, USA
⁹ Department of Physics, University of California, San Diego, CA 92093, USA
¹⁰ Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109, USA
¹¹ RHEA Group for the European Space Agency (ESA), European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC), Camino Bajo del Castillo s/n, 28692 Villanueva de la Cañada, Madrid, Spain

Received: 12 October 2023
Accepted: 14 February 2024

Abstract

The close-in regions of bright quasars’ host galaxies have been difficult to image due to the overwhelming light coming from quasars. With coronagraphic observations in visible light using the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) on the Hubble Space Telescope, we removed 3C 273 quasar light using color-matching reference stars. The observations revealed the host galaxy from 60″ to 0.​​″2 with nearly full angular coverage. Isophote modeling has revealed a new core jet, a core blob, and multiple smaller-scale blobs within 2.​​″5. The blobs could potentially be satellite galaxies or infalling materials towards the central quasar. Using archival STIS data, we constrained the apparent motion of its large scale jets over a 22 yr timeline. By resolving the 3C 273 host galaxy with STIS, our study validates the use of coronagraphs on extragalactic sources for obtaining new insights into the central (at ∼kpc scales) regions of quasar hosts.