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Accretion disk winds are thought to produce many of the characteristicfeatures seen in the spectra of active galactic nuclei (AGN) and quasi-stellarobjects (QSOs). These outflows also represent a natural form of feedbackbetween the central supermassive black hole and its host galaxy. The mechanismfor driving this mass loss remains unknown, although radiation pressuremediated by spectral lines is a leading candidate. Here, we calculate theionization state of, and emergent spectra for, the hydrodynamic simulation of aline-driven disk wind previously presented by Proga & Kallman (2004). Toachieve this, we carry out a comprehensive Monte Carlo simulation of theradiative transfer through, and energy exchange within, the predicted outflow.We find that the wind is much more ionized than originally estimated. This isin part because it is much more difficult to shield any wind regionseffectively when the outflow itself is allowed to reprocess and redirectionizing photons. As a result, the calculated spectrum that would be observedfrom this particular outflow solution would not contain the ultravioletspectral lines that are observed in many AGN/QSOs. Furthermore, the wind is sohighly ionized that line-driving would not actually be efficient. This does notnecessarily mean that line-driven winds are not viable. However, our work doesillustrate that in order to arrive at a self-consistent model of line-drivendisk winds in AGN/QSO, it will be critical to include a more detailed treatmentof radiative transfer and ionization in the next generation of hydrodynamicsimulations.

Line-driven Disk Winds in Active Galactic Nuclei: The Critical Importance of Ionization and Radiative Transfer