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The Acs Fornax Cluster Survey. Ii. The Central Brightness Profiles Of Early-Type Galaxies: A Characteristic Radius On Nuclear Scales And The Transition From Central Luminosity Deficit To Excess, Patrick Côté, Laura Ferrarese, Andrés Jordán, David Merritt, Et Al.
The Acs Fornax Cluster Survey. Ii. The Central Brightness Profiles Of Early-Type Galaxies: A Characteristic Radius On Nuclear Scales And The Transition From Central Luminosity Deficit To Excess, Patrick Côté, Laura Ferrarese, Andrés Jordán, David Merritt, Et Al.
Articles
We analyse brightness profiles for 143 early-type galaxies in the Virgo and Fornax Clusters, observed with the Advanced Camera for Surveys on the Hubble Space Telescope. S´ersic models are found to provide accurate representations of the global profiles with a notable exception: the observed profiles deviate systematically inside a characteristic “break” radius of Rb ≈ 0.02+0.025 −0.01 Re, where Re is the effective radius of the galaxy. The sense of the deviation is such that bright galaxies (MB . −20) typically show central light deficits with respect to the inward extrapolation of the S´ersic model, while the great majority of …
Consequences Of Triaxiality For Gravitational Wave Recoil Of Black Holes, Alessandro Vicari, Roberto Capuzzo-Dolcetta, David Merritt
Consequences Of Triaxiality For Gravitational Wave Recoil Of Black Holes, Alessandro Vicari, Roberto Capuzzo-Dolcetta, David Merritt
Articles
Coalescing binary black holes experience a “kick” due to anisotropic emission of gravitational waves with an amplitude as great as ∼ 200 km s−1. We examine the orbital evolution of black holes that have been kicked from the centers of triaxial galaxies. Time scales for orbital decay are generally longer in triaxial galaxies than in equivalent spherical galaxies, since a kicked black hole does not return directly through the dense center where the dynamical friction force is highest. We evaluate this effect by constructing self-consistent triaxial models and integrating the trajectories of massive particles after they are ejected from the …
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. Xiii. Sbf Distance Catalog And The Three-Dimensional Structure Of The Virgo Cluster, Simona Mei, John P. Blakeslee, Patrick Côté, John L. Tonry, Michael J. West, Laura Ferrarese, Andrés Jordán, Eric W. Peng, André Anthony, David Merritt
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. Xiii. Sbf Distance Catalog And The Three-Dimensional Structure Of The Virgo Cluster, Simona Mei, John P. Blakeslee, Patrick Côté, John L. Tonry, Michael J. West, Laura Ferrarese, Andrés Jordán, Eric W. Peng, André Anthony, David Merritt
Articles
The ACS Virgo Cluster Survey consists of HST/ACS imaging for 100 early–type galaxies in the Virgo cluster, observed in the F475W(≈ SDSS g) and F850LP (≈ SDSS z) filters. We derive distances for 84 of these galaxies using the method of Surface Brightness Fluctuations (SBF), present the SBF distance catalog, and use this database to examine the three-dimensional distribution of early–type galaxies in the Virgo Cluster. The SBF distance moduli have a mean (random) measurement error of 0.07 mag (0.5 Mpc), or roughly three times better than previous SBF measurements for Virgo Cluster galaxies. Five galaxies lie at a distance …
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey Xii: The Luminosity Function Of Globular Clusters In Early Type Galaxies, Andrés Jordán, Dean Mclaughlin, Patrick Côté, Laura Ferrarese, Eric W. Peng, Simona Mei, Daniela Villegas, David Merritt, John L. Tonry, Michael J. West
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey Xii: The Luminosity Function Of Globular Clusters In Early Type Galaxies, Andrés Jordán, Dean Mclaughlin, Patrick Côté, Laura Ferrarese, Eric W. Peng, Simona Mei, Daniela Villegas, David Merritt, John L. Tonry, Michael J. West
Articles
We analyze the luminosity function of the globular clusters (GCs) belonging to the early-type galaxies observed in the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey. We have obtained maximum likelihood estimates for a Gaussian representation of the globular cluster luminosity function (GCLF) for 89 galaxies. We have also fit the luminosity functions with an “evolved Schechter function”, which is meant to reflect the preferential depletion of low-mass GCs, primarily by evaporation due to two-body relaxation, from an initial Schechter mass function similar to that of young massive clusters in local starbursts and mergers. We find a highly significant trend of the GCLF dispersion …
Trends In The Globular Cluster Luminosity Function Of Early-Type Galaxies, Andrés Jordán, Dean E. Mclaughlin, Patrick Côté, David Merritt, Et Al.
Trends In The Globular Cluster Luminosity Function Of Early-Type Galaxies, Andrés Jordán, Dean E. Mclaughlin, Patrick Côté, David Merritt, Et Al.
Articles
We present results from a study of the globular cluster luminosity function (GCLF) in a sample of 89 earlytype galaxies observed as part of the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey. Using a Gaussian parametrization of the GCLF, we find a highly significant correlation between the GCLF dispersion, , and the galaxy luminosity, MB,gal, in the sense that the GC systems in fainter galaxies have narrower luminosity functions. The GCLF dispersions in the Milky Way and M31 are fully consistent with this trend, implying that the correlation between sigma and galaxy luminosity is more fundamental than older suggestions that GCLF shape is …
A Fundamental Relation Between Compact Stellar Nuclei, Supermassive Black Holes, And Their Host Galaxies, Laura Ferrarese, Patrick Côté, Elena Dalla Bontà, David Merritt, Et Al.
A Fundamental Relation Between Compact Stellar Nuclei, Supermassive Black Holes, And Their Host Galaxies, Laura Ferrarese, Patrick Côté, Elena Dalla Bontà, David Merritt, Et Al.
Articles
Imaging surveys with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) have shown that 50–80% of low- and intermediate-luminosity galaxies contain a compact stellar nucleus at their center, regardless of host galaxy morphological type. We combine HST imaging for early-type galaxies from the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey with ground-based long-slit spectra from KPNO to show that the masses of compact stellar nuclei in Virgo Cluster galaxies obey a tight correlation with the masses of the host galaxies. The same correlation is obeyed by the supermassive black holes (SBHs) found in predominantly massive galaxies. The compact stellar nuclei in the Local Group galaxies M33 …
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey Ix: The Color Distributions Of Globular Cluster Systems In Early-Type Galaxies, Eric Peng, Andres Jordan, Patrick Cote
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey Ix: The Color Distributions Of Globular Cluster Systems In Early-Type Galaxies, Eric Peng, Andres Jordan, Patrick Cote
Articles
We present the color distributions of globular cluster (GC) systems for 100 Virgo cluster earlytype galaxies observed in the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey, the deepest and most homogeneous survey of this kind to date. While the color distributions of individual GC systems can show significant variations from one another, their general properties are consistent with continuous trends across galaxy luminosity, color, and stellar mass. On average, galaxies at all luminosities in our study (−22 < MB < −15) appear to have bimodal or asymmetric GC color distributions. Almost all galaxies possess a component of metal-poor GCs, with the average fraction of metal-rich GCs ranging from 15 to 60%. The colors of both subpopulations correlate with host galaxy luminosity and color, with the red GCs having a steeper slope. The steeper correlation seen in the mean color of the entire GC system is driven by the increasing fraction of metal-rich GCs for more luminous galaxies. To convert color to metallicity, we also introduce a preliminary (g–z)-[Fe/H] relation calibrated to Galactic, M49 and M87 GCs. This relation is nonlinear with a steeper slope for [Fe/H] . −0.8. As a result, the metallicities of the metal-poor and metal-rich GCs vary similarly with respect to galaxy luminosity and stellar mass, with relations of [Fe/H]MP ∝ L0.16±0.04 ∝ M0.17±0.04 ⋆ and [Fe/H]MR ∝ L0.26±0.03 ∝ M0.22±0.03 ⋆ , respectively. Although these relations are shallower than the mass-metallicity relation predicted by wind models and observed for dwarf galaxies, they are very similar to the mass-metallicity relation for star forming galaxies in the same mass range. The offset between the two GC populations varies slowly (∝ M0.05 ⋆ ) and is approximately 1 dex across three orders of magnitude in mass, suggesting a nearly universal amount of enrichment between the formation of the two populations of GCs. We also find that although the metal-rich GCs show a larger dispersion in color, it is the metal-poor GCs that have an equal or larger dispersion in metallicity. The similarity in the M⋆–[Fe/H] relations for the two populations, implies that the conditions of GC formation for metal-poor and metal-rich GCs could not have been too different. Like the color-magnitude relation, these relations derived from globular clusters present stringent constraints on the formation and evolution of early-type galaxies.
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. Viii. The Nuclei Of Early-Type Galaxies, Patrick Côté, Slawomir Piatek, Laura Ferrarese, Andrés Jordán, David Merritt, Eric W. Peng, Monica Haşegan, John P. Blakeslee, Simona Mei, Michael J. West, Miloš Milosavljević, John L. Tonry
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. Viii. The Nuclei Of Early-Type Galaxies, Patrick Côté, Slawomir Piatek, Laura Ferrarese, Andrés Jordán, David Merritt, Eric W. Peng, Monica Haşegan, John P. Blakeslee, Simona Mei, Michael J. West, Miloš Milosavljević, John L. Tonry
Articles
The ACS Virgo Cluster Survey is a Hubble Space Telescope program to obtain high-resolution imaging, in widely separated bandpasses (F475W ≈ g and F850LP ≈ z), for 100 early-type members of the Virgo Cluster, spanning a range of ≈ 460 in blue luminosity. We use this large, homogenous dataset to examine the innermost structure of these galaxies and to characterize the properties of their compact central nuclei. We present a sharp upward revision in the frequency of nucleation in early-type galaxies brighter than MB ≈ −15 (66 . fn . 82%) and show that ground-based surveys underestimated the number of …
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. X. Half-Light Radii Of Globular Clusters In Early-Type Galaxies: Environmental Dependencies And A Standard Ruler For Distance Estimation, Andrés Jordán, Patrick Côté, John P. Blakeslee, David Merritt, Et Al.
The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. X. Half-Light Radii Of Globular Clusters In Early-Type Galaxies: Environmental Dependencies And A Standard Ruler For Distance Estimation, Andrés Jordán, Patrick Côté, John P. Blakeslee, David Merritt, Et Al.
Articles
We have measured half-light radii, rh, for thousands of globular clusters (GCs) belonging to the one hundred early-type galaxies observed in the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey and the elliptical galaxy NGC 4697. An analysis of the dependencies of the measured half-light radii on both the properties of the GCs themselves and their host galaxies reveals that, in analogy with GCs in the Galaxy but in a milder fashion, the average half-light radius increases with increasing galactocentric distance or, alternatively, with decreasing galaxy surface brightness. For the first time, we find that the average half-light radius decreases with the host galaxy …