EUCLIA - Exploring the UV/optical continuum lag in active galactic
  nuclei. I. a model without light echoing
  The tight inter-band correlation and the lag-wavelength relation among
UV/optical continua of active galactic nuclei have been firmly established.
They are usually understood within the widespread reprocessing scenario,
however, the implied inter-band lags are generally too small. Furthermore, it
is challenged by new evidences, such as the X-ray reprocessing yields too much
high frequency UV/optical variations as well as it fails to reproduce the
observed timescale-dependent color variations among {\it Swift} lightcurves of
NGC 5548. In a different manner, we demonstrate that an upgraded inhomogeneous
accretion disk model, whose local {\it independent} temperature fluctuations
are subject to a speculated {\it common} large-scale temperature fluctuation,
can intrinsically generate the tight inter-band correlation and lag across
UV/optical, and be in nice agreement with several observational properties of
NGC 5548, including the timescale-dependent color variation. The emergent lag
is a result of the {\it differential regression capability} of local
temperature fluctuations when responding to the large-scale fluctuation. An
average speed of propagations as large as $\gtrsim 15\%$ of the speed of light
may be required by this common fluctuation. Several potential physical
mechanisms for such propagations are discussed. Our interesting
phenomenological scenario may shed new light on comprehending the UV/optical
continuum variations of active galactic nuclei.
