The instrinsic UV/soft x-ray spectrum of quasars

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The detection of a HeII absorption trough in the spectra of three high-redshift quasars provides new constraints on the spectral shape of the UV extragalactic background. The relative strengths of the observed flux decrements at the rest-frame wavelengths of 1216 and 304 A require a relatively soft radiation field at 4 ryd compared to 1 ryd. If the ionizing metagalactic flux is dominated by the integrated light from QSOs, and the HeII reionization of the universe was completed well before z 3, then the UV/soft X-ray spectrum of individual quasars at these epochs must, once the cosmological ``filtering'' through material along the line of sight is taken into account, satisfy similar constraints on the average. We model the propagation of AGN-like ionizing radiation through the intergalactic medium using CUBA, a numerical code developed in our prior work. We show that, in order to explain the reported HeII absorption, any thermal component responsible for the ``soft X-ray excess'' observed in the spectra of AGNs at z<0.3 must, at z 3, have a typical temperature >80 eV, and a luminosity not exceeding 20% of that of the ``UV bump''.