Deep Chandra Observations of ESO 428-G014. II. Spectral Properties and Morphology of the Large-scale Extended X-Ray Emission

We present a deep Chandra spectral and spatial study of the kpc-scale diffuse X-ray emission of the Compton-thick (CT) active galactic nucleus (AGN) ESO 428-G014. The entire spectrum is best fit with composite photoionization + thermal models. The diffuse emission is more extended at lower energies (<3 keV). The smaller extent of the hard continuum and Fe Kα profiles implies that the optically thicker clouds responsible for this scattering may be relatively more prevalent closer to the nucleus. These clouds must not prevent soft ionizing X-rays from the AGN escaping to larger radii, in order to have photoionized ISM at larger radii. This suggests that at smaller radii, there may be a larger population of molecular clouds to scatter the hard X-rays, as in the Milky Way. The diffuse emission is also significantly extended in the cross-cone direction, where the AGN emission would be mostly obscured by the torus in the standard AGN model. Our results suggest that the transmission of the obscuring region in the cross-cone direction is ~10% of that in the cone direction. In the 0.3–1.5 keV band, the ratio of cross-cone to cone photons increases to ~84%, suggesting an additional soft diffuse emission component disjoint from the AGN. This could be due to hot ISM trapped in the potential of the galaxy. The luminosity of this component, ~5 × 1038 erg s−1, is roughly consistent with the thermal component suggested by the spectral fits in the 170–900 pc annulus.