Turbulent and fast motions of H2 gas in active galactic nuclei
  Querying the Spitzer archive for optically-selected active galactic nuclei
(AGN) observed in high-resolution mode spectroscopy, we identified radio and/or
interacting galaxies with highly turbulent motions of the H2 gas at a
temperature of a few hundred Kelvin. Unlike all other AGN that have unresolved
H2 line profiles at a spectral resolution of ~600, 3C236, 3C293,
IRAS09039+0503, MCG-2-58-22, and Mrk463E have intrinsic velocity dispersions
exceeding 200 km/s for at least two of the rotational S0, S1, S2, and S3 lines.
In a sixth source, 4C12.50, a blue wing was detected in the S1 and S2 line
profiles, indicating the presence of a warm molecular gas component moving at
-640 km/s with respect to the bulk of the gas at systemic velocity. Its mass is
5.2*10^7 M_sun, accounting for more than one fourth of the H2 gas at 374K, but
less than 1% of the cold H2 gas computed from CO observations. Because no
diffuse gas component of 4C12.50 has been observed to date to be moving at more
than 250 km/s from systemic velocity, the H2 line wings are unlikely to be
tracing gas in shock regions along the tidal tails of this merging system. They
can instead be tracing gas driven by a jet or entrained by a nuclear outflow,
which is known to emerge from the west nucleus of 4C12.50. It is improbable
that such an outflow, with an estimated mass loss rate of 130 M_sun/yr,
entirely quenches the star formation around this nucleus.
