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While supermassive black holes are ubiquitous features of galactic nuclei,only a small minority are observed during episodes of luminous accretion. Thephysical mechanism(s) driving the onset of fueling and ignition in these activegalactic nuclei (AGN) are still largely unknown for many galaxies andAGN-selection criteria. Attention has focused on AGN triggering by means ofmajor galaxy mergers gravitationally funneling gas towards the galactic center,with evidence both for and against this scenario. However, several recentstudies have found that radio-loud AGN overwhelmingly reside in ongoing orrecent major galaxy mergers. In this study, we test the hypothesis that majorgalaxy mergers are important triggers for radio-loud AGN activity in powerfulquasars during cosmic noon (1 < z < 2). To this end, we compare Hubble SpaceTelescope WFC3/IR observations of the z > 1 3CR radio-loud broad-lined quasarsto three matched radio-quiet quasar control samples. We find strong evidencefor major-merger activity in nearly all radio-loud AGN, in contrast to the muchlower merger fraction in the radio-quiet AGN. These results suggest majorgalaxy mergers are key ingredients to launching powerful radio jets. Given manyof our radio-loud quasars are blue, our results present a possible challenge tothe "blow-out" paradigm of galaxy evolution models in which blue quasars arethe quiescent end result following a period of red quasar feedback initiated bya galaxy merger. Finally, we find a tight correlation between black hole massand host galaxy luminosity for these different high-redshift AGN samplesinconsistent with those observed for local elliptical galaxies.

Powerful Radio-Loud Quasars are Triggered by Galaxy Mergers in the Cosmic Bright Ages