New Method for Exploring Super-Eddington AGNs by Near-infrared
  Observations
  We propose a new method to explore the candidate super-Eddington active
galactic nuclei (AGNs). We examine the properties of infrared (IR) emission
from the inner edge of the dusty torus in AGNs, which are powered by super- or
sub-Eddington accretion flows around black holes, by considering the dependence
of the polar angle on the radiation flux of accretion flows (Watarai et al.
2005). We find that for super-Eddington AGNs, of which the mass accretion rate
is more than 10^2 times larger than the Eddington rate, the ratio of the AGN IR
luminosity and the disc bolometric luminosity is less than 10^-2, unless the
half opening angle of the torus (theta_torus) is small (theta_torus <65
degree). This is due to the self-occultation effect, whereby the
self-absorption at the outer region of the super-Eddington flow dilutes the
illumination of the torus. Such a small luminosity ratio is not observed in
sub-Eddington AGNs, whose mass accretion rate is comparable to or no more than
10 times larger than the Eddington mass accretion rate, except for extremely
thin tori (theta_torus >85 degree). We also consider the properties of the
near-IR (NIR) emission radiated from hot dust >1000 K. We find that
super-Eddington AGNs have a ratio of the NIR luminosity to the bolometric
luminosity, L_NIR,AGN/L_bol,disc, at least one order of magnitude smaller than
for sub-Eddington AGNs for a wide range of half opening angle (theta_torus > 65
degree), for various types of dusty torus model. Thus, a relatively low
L_NIR,AGN/L_bol,disc is a property that allows identification of candidate
super-Eddington AGNs. Lastly, we discuss the possibility that NIR-faint quasars
at redshift z=6 discovered by a recent deep SDSS survey may be young quasars
whose black holes grow via super-Eddington accretion.
