The Two-Point Correlation of 2QZ Quasars and 2SLAQ LRGs: From a Quasar
  Fueling Perspective
  Public data from the 2dF quasar survey (2QZ) and 2dF/SDSS LRG & QSO (2SLAQ),
with their vast reservoirs of spectroscopically located and identified sources,
afford us the chance to more accurately study their real space correlations in
the hopes of identifying the physical processes that trigger quasar activity.
We have used these two public databases to measure the projected cross
correlation, $\omega_p$, between quasars and luminous red galaxies. We find the
projected two-point correlation to have a fitted clustering radius of $r_0, =
5.3 \pm 0.6 $ and a slope, $\gamma =1.83 \pm 0.42 $ on scales from
0.7-27$h^{-1}$Mpc.
  We attempt to understand this strong correlation by separating the LRG sample
into 2 populations of blue and red galaxies. We measure at the cross
correlation with each population. We find that these quasars have a stronger
correlation amplitude with the bluer, more recently starforming population in
our sample than the redder passively evolving population, which has a
correlation that is much more noisy and seems to flatten on scales $<
5h^{-1}$Mpc. We compare this result to published work on hierarchical models.
The stronger correlation of bright quasars with LRGs that have undergone a
recent burst of starformation suggests that the physical mechanisms that
produce both activities are related and that minor mergers or tidal effects may
be important triggers of bright quasar activity and/or that bright quasars are
less highly biased than faint quasars.
