NEAR-INFRARED IMAGING OF LOW-REDSHIFT QUASAR HOST GALAXIES

We present H-band images of a complete sample of 24 low-luminosity qua sars selected from the Bright Quasar Survey. We detect the quasar host galaxy in at least 22 of these objects. We use a one-dimensional radi al profile analysis to remove the contribution of the nucleus to the H -band light and to investigate the properties of the underlying galaxy . In most cases, the galaxy profiles are fitted better by exponential disk models than by de Vaucouleurs models. The average galaxy magnitud e is [M(H)] = -23.9 mag, which is approximately the H magnitude of an L galaxy. This result argues against the quasar activity being trigge red by the merger of two large galaxies. No quasar host galaxies have inclinations greater than 60-degrees, suggesting that obscuration near the active nucleus hides many of these objects from our view; their s pace density could be underestimated by a factor of approximately 2. W e combine our results with previously published results from CCD imagi ng to show that the galaxies we detect are about 0.5 mag bluer in V-H than normal galaxies. Such colors can arise from a heightened level of star formation compared with normal galaxies and are consistent with these galaxies having been the sites of luminous starbursts about 10(8 ) yr ago.