THE CHANDRA COSMOS-LEGACY SURVEY : SOURCE X-RAY SPECTRAL PROPERTIES

We present the X-ray spectral analysis of the 1855 extragalactic sources in the Chandra COSMOS-Legacy survey catalog having more than 30 net counts in the 0.5-7 keV band. A total of 38% of the sources are optically classified type 1 active galactic nuclei (AGNs), 60% are type 2 AGNs, and 2% are passive, low-redshift galaxies. We study the distribution of AGN photon index Gamma and of the intrinsic absorption N-H,N-z based on the sources' optical classification: type 1 AGNs have a slightly steeper mean photon index Gamma than type 2 AGNs, which, on the other hand, have average N-H,N-z similar to 3 times higher than type 1 AGNs. We find that similar to 15% of type 1 AGNs have N-H,N-z > 10(22) cm(-2), i.e., are obscured according to the X-ray spectral fitting; the vast majority of these sources have L2-10 (keV) > 10(44) erg s(-1). The existence of these objects suggests that optical and X-ray obscuration can be caused by different phenomena, the X-ray obscuration being, for example, caused by dust-free material surrounding the inner part of the nuclei. Approximately 18% of type 2 AGNs have N-H,N-z <10(22) cm(-2), and most of these sources have low X-ray luminosities (L2-10 (keV)