Bibcode
Erwin, P.; Vega Beltran, J. C.; Beckman, J.
Bibliographical reference
American Astronomical Society, 197th AAS Meeting, #37.12; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 32, p.1452
Advertised on:
12
2000
Citations
1
Refereed citations
1
Description
We present observations and analysis of three barred S0 galaxies which
contain smooth, luminous, stellar nuclear rings within their bars. These
rings, which have little or no dust and are approximately the same color
as surrounding bar and bulge, are probably the old remnants of
bar-driven circumnuclear starburst episodes similar to those seen in
many barred galaxies today. Using kinematic data from long-slit
spectroscopy, we construct rotation and resonance curves and relate the
relative sizes of the rings to possible bar resonances. Two of the
galaxies are actually double-barred, with misaligned secondary bars
inside the nuclear rings. In at least one of these (NGC 4340), the
resonance curves indicate that the nuclear ring lies near or at one of
the outer bar's inner Lindblad resonances; this is a plausible location
for the secondary bar's corotation radius. We also discuss the
difficulties inherent in detecting and identifying such rings, and show
some of the surprising ways in which stellar rings can distort galaxy
isophotes and ellipse fits.