Search for sub-millimeter H2O masers in active galaxies - the detection
  of a 321 GHz H2O maser in NGC4945
  We present further results of a search for extragalactic submillimeter H2O
masers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA). The
detection of a 321 GHz H2O maser in the nearby Type 2 Seyfert galaxy, the
Circinus galaxy, has previously been reported, and here the spectral analysis
of four other galaxies is described. We have discovered H2O maser emission at
321 GHz toward the center of NGC 4945, a nearby Type 2 Seyfert. The maser
emission shows Doppler-shifted velocity features with velocity ranges similar
to those of the previously reported 22 GHz H2O masers, however the
non-contemporaneous observations also show differences in velocity offsets. The
sub-parsec-scale distribution of the 22 GHz H2O masers revealed by earlier VLBI
(Very Long Baseline Interferometry) observations suggests that the
submillimeter masers could arise in an edge-on rotating disk. The maser
features remain unresolved by the synthesized beam of ~ 0.54 (~30 pc) and are
located toward the 321 GHz continuum peak within errors. A marginally detected
(3 sigma) high-velocity feature is redshifted by 579 km/s with respect to the
systemic velocity of the galaxy. Assuming that this feature is real and arises
from a Keplerian rotating disk in this galaxy, it is located at a radius of
~0.020 pc (~1.5 x 10^5 Schwarzschild radii), which would enable molecular
material closer to the central engine to be probed than the 22 GHz H2O masers.
This detection confirms that submillimeter H2O masers are a potential tracer of
the circumnuclear regions of active galaxies, which will benefit from higher
angular resolution studies with ALMA.
