Modeling the H2O submillimeter emission in extragalactic sources
  Recent observational studies have shown that H2O emission at (rest)
submillimeter wavelengths is ubiquitous in infrared galaxies, both in the local
and in the early Universe, suggestive of far-infrared pumping of H2O by dust in
warm regions. In this work, models are presented that show that (i) the
highest-lying H2O lines (E_{upper}>400 K) are formed in very warm (T_{dust}>~90
K) regions and require high H2O columns (N_{H2O}>~3x10^{17} cm^{-2}), while
lower lying lines can be efficiently excited with T_{dust}~45-75 K and
N_{H2O}~(0.5-2)x10^{17} cm^{-2}; (ii) significant collisional excitation of the
lowest lying (E_{upper}<200 K) levels, which enhances the overall
L_{H2O}-L_{IR} ratios, is identified in sources where the ground-state para-H2O
1_{11}-0_{00} line is detected in emission; (iii) the H2O-to-infrared (8-1000
um) luminosity ratio is expected to decrease with increasing T_{dust} for all
lines with E_{upper}<~300 K, as has recently been reported in a sample of
LIRGs, but increases with T_{dust} for the highest lying H2O lines
(E_{upper}>400 K); (iv) we find theoretical upper limits for L_{H2O}/L_{IR} in
warm environments, owing to H2O line saturation; (v) individual models are
presented for two very different prototypical galaxies, the Seyfert 2 galaxy
NGC 1068 and the nearest ultraluminous infrared galaxy Arp 220, showing that
the excited submillimeter H2O emission is dominated by far-infrared pumping in
both cases; (vi) the L_{H2O}-L_{IR} correlation previously reported in
observational studies indicates depletion or exhaustion time scales,
t_{dep}=Sigma_{gas}/Sigma_{SFR}, of <~12 Myr for star-forming sources where
lines up to E_{upper}=300 K are detected, in agreement with the values
previously found for (U)LIRGs from HCN millimeter emission...
