A hard look at NGC 5347: revealing a nearby Compton-thick AGN
  Current measurements show that the observed fraction of Compton-thick (CT)
AGN is smaller than the expected values needed to explain the cosmic X-ray
background. Prior fits to the X-ray spectrum of the nearby Seyfert-2 galaxy NGC
5347 ($z=0.00792,\, D =35.5 \rm ~Mpc $) have alternately suggested a CT and
Compton-thin source. Combining archival data from $Suzaku$, $Chandra$, and -
most importantly - new data from $NuSTAR$, and using three distinct families of
models, we show that NGC 5347 is an obscured CTAGN ($N_{\rm H} > 2.23\times
10^{24}~\rm cm^{-2}$). Its 2-30~keV spectrum is dominated by reprocessed
emission from distant material, characterized by a strong Fe K$\alpha$ line and
a Compton hump. We found a large equivalent width of the Fe K$\alpha$ line
($\rm EW = 2.3 \pm 0.3$ keV) and a high intrinsic-to-observed flux ratio ($\sim
100$). All of these observations are typical for bona fide CTAGN. We estimate a
bolometric luminosity of $L_{\rm bol} \simeq 0.014 \pm 0.005~L_{\rm Edd.}$. The
$Chandra$ image of NGC 5347 reveals the presence of extended emission
dominating the soft X-ray spectrum ($E < 2\,\rm keV$), which coincides with the
[O III] emission detected in the $Hubble ~Space~ Telescope$ images. Comparison
to other CTAGN suggests that NGC 5347 is broadly consistent with the average
properties of this source class. We simulated $XRISM$ and $Athena$/X-IFU
spectra of the source, showing the potential of these future missions in
identifying CTAGN in the soft X-rays.
