Bibcode
DOI
Balcells, Marc; Graham, Alister W.; Peletier, Reynier F.
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 665, Issue 2, pp. 1084-1103.
Advertised on:
8
2007
Journal
Citations
110
Refereed citations
98
Description
We have measured the central structural properties for a sample of
S0-Sbc galaxies down to scales of ~10 pc using Hubble Space Telescope
NICMOS images. Central star clusters are found in 58% of our sample.
Their near-infrared luminosities scale with the host bulge luminosities,
as reported in 2003 by Balcells and coworkers. In terms of photometric
masses, the relation is MPS=107.75+/-0.15
(Mbul/1010Msolar)0.76+/-0.13.
Put together with recent data on bulges hosting supermassive black
holes, we infer a nonlinear dependency of the ``central massive object''
mass on the host bulge mass such that
MCMO/Msolar=107.51+/-0.06(Mbul/1010
Msolar)0.84+/-0.06. The linear relation presented
by Ferrarese and coworkers may be biased at the low-mass end by the
inclusion of the disk light from cluster lenticular galaxies. Bulge-disk
decompositions reaching to the outer disk show that ~90% of our galaxies
possess central light excesses that can be modeled with an inner
exponential and/or an unresolved source. All the extended nuclear
components, with sizes of a few hundred parsecs, have disky isophotes,
which suggest that they may be inner disks, rings, or bars; their colors
are redder than those of the underlying bulge, arguing against a recent
origin for their stellar populations. Surface brightness profiles (of
the total galaxy light, and the bulge component on its own) rise inward
to the resolution limit of the data, with a continuous distribution of
logarithmic slopes from the low values typical of dwarf ellipticals
(0.1<=γ<=0.3) to the high values (γ~1) typical of
intermediate-luminosity ellipticals; the nuclear slope bimodality
reported by others is not present in our sample.
Based on observations made with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope,
obtained at the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by
the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under
NASA contract NAS 5-26555.
Based on observations made with the Isaac Newton Telescope operated on
the island of La Palma by the Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes in the
Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de
Astrofísica de Canarias.