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Molecular hydrogen emission in Cygnus A

We present J, H and K-band spectroscopy of Cygnus A, spanning 1.0-2.4 micron in the rest-frame and hence several rovibrational H2, H recombination and [FeII] emission lines. The lines are spatially extended by up to 6kpc from the nucleus, but their distinct kinematics indicate that the three groups (H, H2 and [FeII]) are not wholly produced in the same gas. The broadest line, [FeII]1.644, exhibits a non-gaussian profile with a broad base (FWHM=1040 km/s), perhaps due to interaction with the radio source. Extinctions to the line-emitting regions substantially exceed earlier measurements based on optical H recombination lines. Hard X-rays from the quasar nucleus are likely to dominate the excitation of the H2 emission. The results of Maloney, Hollenbach and Tielens (1996) are thus used to infer the total mass of gas in H2 v=1-0 S(1)-emitting clouds as a function of radius, for gas densities of 10^3 and 10^5 cm^-3, and stopping column densities N_H=10^22-10^24 cm^-2. Assuming azimuthal symmetry, at least 2.3E8 Msun of such material is present within 5kpc of the nucleus, if the line-emitting clouds see an unobscured quasar spectrum. Alternatively, if the bulk of the X-ray absorption to the nucleus inferred by Ueno et al. (1994) arises in a circumnuclear torus, the implied gas mass rises to 10^10 Msun. The latter plausibly accounts for 10^9 yr of mass deposition from the cluster cooling flow, for which Mdot \simeq 10 Msun/yr within this radius.