Super-size Me: The Big Multi-AGN Catalog (The Big MAC) Data Release 1: The Source Catalog

Galaxy mergers represent the most transformative and dramatic avenue for galaxy and supermassive black hole (SMBH) evolution. Multiple active galactic nuclei (multi-AGNs) are expected to ignite, grow, and evolve alongside the host galaxies, and these represent different evolutionary stages of the SMBHs over the merger sequence. However, no comprehensive census exists of observed multi-AGN systems. Here we present the Big Multi-AGN Catalog (the Big MAC), the first literature-complete catalog of all known (confirmed and candidate) multi-AGN systems, which includes dual AGNs (separations ∼0.03–110 kpc), binary AGNs (gravitationally bound, ≲30 pc), and recoiling AGNs, gleaned from hundreds of literature articles spanning the years 1970–2020. The Big MAC is the first archive to assemble all multi-AGN systems and candidates across all selection methods, redshifts, and galaxy mass ratios, and this catalog offers a solid foundation for archival and targeted multiwavelength follow-up investigations. In this work, we provide an overview of the creation of the multi-AGN literature library and the catalog itself, present definitions for different multi-AGN classes (including new definitions for dual AGNs derived from galaxy pairs in Illustris-TNG100), describe the general properties of the catalog as a function of redshift space and separation, and we provide a thorough examination of selection and confirmation method usage within the literature. We also discuss best practices for the multi-AGN literature, and we emphasize that a diverse, multiwavelength array of selection approaches is crucial for a complete understanding of multi-AGNs and—by extension—answering long-standing, open questions regarding the importance of AGNs and galaxy mergers.