Identify the nature and location of obscuring material in high-redshift obscured quasars

Identify the nature and location of the obscuring material in the obscured SHELLQs quasars and determine whether the obscuration is concentrated around the nucleus or extends across the host galaxy.

Background

The obscured SHELLQs sources show weak ultraviolet continua relative to their emission lines and broad Balmer components in several cases, implying that the continuum source and part of the broad-line region may be hidden. However, the observations do not determine whether the obscuring material is nuclear, circumnuclear, or distributed on host-galaxy scales. The authors propose ALMA and hot-dust observations as means of distinguishing these possibilities.

References

These observations motivate an interpretation in which the continuum source and part of the BLR are hidden, although the nature and location of the obscuring material remain uncertain. ALMA observations could constrain the host dust reservoir and gas distribution; combined with measurements of hot-dust emission, they would help assess whether obscuration is concentrated around the nucleus or extends across the host.

— A dust-reddened quasar in a [C II]-luminous host at z=6.55  (2610.13758 - Yang et al., 9 Oct 2026) in Section 4.4, “Reddened and obscured quasars at \(z>6\)”