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1. VAR-PZ: Constraining the photometric redshifts of quasars using variability

   https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202557223  

   Satheesh-Sheeba, S; Assef, R J; Anguita, T; Sánchez-Sáez, P; Shirley, R; Ananna, T T; Bauer, F E; Bobrick, A; Bornancini, C G; Bosman, S_E I; et al (April 2026, Astronomy & Astrophysics)

   The Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) is expected to obtain observations of over ten million quasars. The survey’s exceptional cadence and sensitivity will enable a significant fraction of these objects to be monitored in theugrizybands, spanning observed wavelengths of approximately 0.3 − 1.0 μm. The unprecedented number of sources makes spectroscopic follow-up for the vast majority of them unfeasible in the near future, so most studies will have to rely on photometric redshift estimates which are traditionally much less reliable for Active Galactic Nuclei (AGNs) than for inactive galaxies. This work presents a novel methodology to constrain the photometric redshift of AGNs that leverages the effects of cosmological time dilation, and of the luminosity and wavelength dependence of AGN variability. Specifically, we assume that the variability can be modeled as a damped random walk (DRW) process, and we adopted a parametric model to characterize the DRW timescale (τ) and asymptotic amplitude of the variability (SF_∞) based on the redshift, the rest-frame wavelength, and the AGN luminosity. We constructed variability-based photometric redshift (photo-z) priors by modeling the observed variability using the expected DRW parameters at a given redshift. These variability-based photo-z(VAR-PZ) priors were then combined with traditional spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting to improve the redshift estimates from SED fitting. Validation was performed using observational data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), demonstrating significant reduction in catastrophic outliers by more than 10% in comparison with SED fitting techniques and improvements in redshift precision. The simulated light curves with both SDSS and LSST-like cadences and baselines confirm thatVAR-PZwill be able to constrain the photometric redshifts of SDSS-like AGNs by bringing the outlier fractions down to below 15% from 32% (SED alone) at the end of the survey. 

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2. Photometric Redshifts in JWST Deep Fields: A Pixel-Based Alternative with DeepDISC

   https://doi.org/10.33232/001c.156099  

   Merz, Grant; Zhuang, Ming-Yang; Li, Junyao; Yang, Qian; Shen, Yue; Liu, Xin; Crenshaw, John Franklin (January 2026, The Open Journal of Astrophysics)

   Photo-z algorithms that utilize SED template fitting have matured, and are widely adopted for use on high-redshift near-infrared data that provides a unique window into the early universe. Alternative photo-z methods have been developed, largely within the context of low-redshift optical surveys. Machine learning based approaches have gained footing in this regime, including those that utilize raw pixel information instead of aperture photometry. However, the efficacy of image-based algorithms on high-redshift, near-infrared data remains underexplored. Here, we test the performance of Detection, Instance Segmentation and Classification with Deep Learning (DeepDISC) on photometric redshift estimation with NIRCam images from the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES) program. DeepDISC is designed to produce probabilistic photometric redshift estimates directly from images, after detecting and deblending sources in a scene. Using NIRCam-only images and a compiled catalog of spectroscopic redshifts, we show that DeepDISC produces reliable photo-zs and uncertainties comparable to those estimated from template fitting using HST+JWST filters; DeepDISC even outperforms template fitting (lower scatter/fewer outliers) when the input photometric filters are matched. Compared with template fitting, DeepDISC does not require measured photometry from images, and can produce a catalog of 94000 photo-zs in ~4 minutes on a single NVIDIA A40 GPU. While current spectroscopic training samples are small and incomplete in color-magnitude space, this work demonstrates the potential of DeepDISC for increasingly larger image volumes and spectroscopic samples from ongoing and future programs. We discuss the impact of the training data on applications to broader samples and produce a catalog of photo-zs for all JADES DR2 photometric sources in the GOOD-S field, with quality flags indicating caveats. 

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3. The eROSITA Final Equatorial-Depth Survey (eFEDS): Identification and characterization of the counterparts to point-like sources

   https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202141631  

   Salvato, M.; Wolf, J.; Dwelly, T.; Georgakakis, A.; Brusa, M.; Merloni, A.; Liu, T.; Toba, Y.; Nandra, K.; Lamer, G.; et al (May 2022, Astronomy & Astrophysics)

   Context. In November 2019, eROSITA on board of the Spektrum-Roentgen-Gamma (SRG) observatory started to map the entire sky in X-rays. After the four-year survey program, it will reach a flux limit that is about 25 times deeper than ROSAT. During the SRG performance verification phase, eROSITA observed a contiguous 140 deg 2 area of the sky down to the final depth of the eROSITA all-sky survey (eROSITA Final Equatorial-Depth Survey; eFEDS), with the goal of obtaining a census of the X-ray emitting populations (stars, compact objects, galaxies, clusters of galaxies, and active galactic nuclei) that will be discovered over the entire sky. Aims. This paper presents the identification of the counterparts to the point sources detected in eFEDS in the main and hard samples and their multi-wavelength properties, including redshift. Methods. To identifyy the counterparts, we combined the results from two independent methods ( NWAY and ASTROMATCH ), trained on the multi-wavelength properties of a sample of 23k XMM-Newton sources detected in the DESI Legacy Imaging Survey DR8. Then spectroscopic redshifts and photometry from ancillary surveys were collated to compute photometric redshifts. Results. Of the eFEDS sources, 24 774 of 27 369 have reliable counterparts (90.5%) in the main sample and 231 of 246 sourcess (93.9%) have counterparts in the hard sample, including 2514 (3) sources for which a second counterpart is equally likely. By means of reliable spectra, Gaia parallaxes, and/or multi-wavelength properties, we have classified the reliable counterparts in both samples into Galactic (2695) and extragalactic sources (22 079). For about 340 of the extragalactic sources, we cannot rule out the possibility that they are unresolved clusters or belong to clusters. Inspection of the distributions of the X-ray sources in various optical/IR colour-magnitude spaces reveal a rich variety of diverse classes of objects. The photometric redshifts are most reliable within the KiDS/VIKING area, where deep near-infrared data are also available. Conclusions. This paper accompanies the eROSITA early data release of all the observations performed during the performance and verification phase. Together with the catalogues of primary and secondary counterparts to the main and hard samples of the eFEDS survey, this paper releases their multi-wavelength properties and redshifts. 

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4. A Southern Photometric Quasar Catalog from the Dark Energy Survey Data Release 2

   https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4365/ac9ea8  

   Yang, Qian; Shen, Yue (December 2022, The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series)

   Abstract We present a catalog of 1.4 million photometrically selected quasar candidates in the southern hemisphere over the ∼5000 deg²Dark Energy Survey (DES) wide survey area. We combine optical photometry from the DES second data release (DR2) with available near-infrared (NIR) and the all-sky unWISE mid-infrared photometry in the selection. We build models of quasars, galaxies, and stars with multivariate skew-tdistributions in the multidimensional space of relative fluxes as functions of redshift (or color for stars) and magnitude. Our selection algorithm assigns probabilities for quasars, galaxies, and stars and simultaneously calculates photometric redshifts (photo-z) for quasar and galaxy candidates. Benchmarking on spectroscopically confirmed objects, we successfully classify (with photometry) 94.7% of quasars, 99.3% of galaxies, and 96.3% of stars when all IR bands (NIRYJHKand WISE W1W2) are available. The classification and photo-zregression success rates decrease when fewer bands are available. Our quasar (galaxy) photo-zquality, defined as the fraction of objects with the difference between the photo-z z_pand the spectroscopic redshiftz_s, ∣Δz∣ ≡ ∣z_s−z_p∣/(1 +z_s) ≤ 0.1, is 92.2% (98.1%) when all IR bands are available, decreasing to 72.2% (90.0%) using optical DES data only. Our photometric quasar catalog achieves an estimated completeness of 89% and purity of 79% atr< 21.5 (0.68 million quasar candidates), with reduced completeness and purity at 21.5 <r≲ 24. Among the 1.4 million quasar candidates, 87,857 have existing spectra, and 84,978 (96.7%) of them are spectroscopically confirmed quasars. Finally, we provide quasar, galaxy, and star probabilities for all (0.69 billion) photometric sources in the DES DR2 coadded photometric catalog. 

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5. Dwarf AGNs from Optical Variability for the Origins of Seeds (DAVOS): insights from the dark energy survey deep fields

   https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stac2262  

   Burke, Colin J; Liu, Xin; Shen, Yue; Phadke, Kedar A; Yang, Qian; Hartley, Will G; Harrison, Ian; Palmese, Antonella; Guo, Hengxiao; Zhang, Kaiwen; et al (September 2022, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society)

   ABSTRACT We present a sample of 706, z < 1.5 active galactic nuclei (AGNs) selected from optical photometric variability in three of the Dark Energy Survey (DES) deep fields (E2, C3, and X3) over an area of 4.64 deg2. We construct light curves using difference imaging aperture photometry for resolved sources and non-difference imaging PSF photometry for unresolved sources, respectively, and characterize the variability significance. Our DES light curves have a mean cadence of 7 d, a 6-yr baseline, and a single-epoch imaging depth of up to g ∼ 24.5. Using spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting, we find 26 out of total 706 variable galaxies are consistent with dwarf galaxies with a reliable stellar mass estimate ($$M_{\ast }\lt 10^{9.5}\, {\rm M}_\odot$$; median photometric redshift of 0.9). We were able to constrain rapid characteristic variability time-scales (∼ weeks) using the DES light curves in 15 dwarf AGN candidates (a subset of our variable AGN candidates) at a median photometric redshift of 0.4. This rapid variability is consistent with their low black hole (BH) masses. We confirm the low-mass AGN nature of one source with a high S/N optical spectrum. We publish our catalogue, optical light curves, and supplementary data, such as X-ray properties and optical spectra, when available. We measure a variable AGN fraction versus stellar mass and compare to results from a forward model. This work demonstrates the feasibility of optical variability to identify AGNs with lower BH masses in deep fields, which may be more ‘pristine’ analogues of supermassive BH seeds. 

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