State-dependent broadband X-ray timing reconfiguration in the changing-look AGN NGC 1566
State-dependent broadband X-ray timing reconfiguration in the changing-look AGN NGC 1566
Yu Tao, Jie Tang, Xuan Wei, Xiaohan Zhang
AbstractNGC 1566 has exhibited dramatic state changes in its X-ray spectrum, but the evolution of its broadband timing properties remains poorly constrained. We combine long-term Swift monitoring with high-time-resolution XMM-Newton observations to model the broadband X-ray power spectral density (PSD) in the dim and bright states. In the hard band, the PSD bend frequency shifts by about 1 dex between the two states, implying a substantially longer characteristic variability timescale in the bright state. The relative timing behaviour of the soft and hard bands also changes with state. In the dim state, the soft-band bend frequency is higher than the hard-band value by about 0.49 dex, whereas in the bright state the two become broadly consistent. The broadband variability evolution of NGC 1566 therefore involves not only an overall shift in characteristic timescale, but also a state-dependent change in the soft-hard timing relation, from a more stratified to a more tightly coupled configuration. Combined with previous spectral results, this supports a genuine reconfiguration of the inner radiative structure during the changing-look transition.