Formation of S0 galaxies through mergers. V - Antitruncated stellar discs resulting from major mergers
| Autor: | Cristina Rodríguez-Pérez, Trinidad Tapia, Jesús Gallego, Jaime Zamorano, Miguel Querejeta, John E. Beckman, Pablo G. Pérez-González, Alejandro Borlaff, M. Carmen Eliche-Moral |
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| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2014 |
| Předmět: |
Physics
Astrofísica FOS: Physical sciences Astronomy and Astrophysics Radius Astrophysics Astrophysics::Cosmology and Extragalactic Astrophysics Astrophysics - Astrophysics of Galaxies Galaxy Astronomía Space and Planetary Science Astrophysics of Galaxies (astro-ph.GA) Surface brightness Astrophysics::Earth and Planetary Astrophysics Scaling Lenticular galaxy Astrophysics::Galaxy Astrophysics |
| Zdroj: | E-Prints Complutense: Archivo Institucional de la UCM Universidad Complutense de Madrid E-Prints Complutense. Archivo Institucional de la UCM instname |
| Popis: | Lenticular galaxies (S0s) are more likely to host antitruncated (Type-III) stellar discs than galaxies of later Hubble types. Major mergers are popularly considered too violent mechanisms to form these breaks. We have investigated whether major mergers can result into S0-like remnants with realistic antitruncated stellar discs or not. We have analysed 67 relaxed S0 and E/S0 remnants resulting from dissipative N-body simulations of major mergers from the GalMer database. We have simulated realistic R-band surface brightness profiles of the remnants to identify those with antitruncated stellar discs. Their inner and outer discs and the breaks are quantitatively characterized to compare with real data. Nearly 70% of our S0-like remnants are antitruncated, meaning that major mergers that result in S0s have a high probability of producing Type-III stellar discs. Our remnants lie on top of the extrapolations of the observational trends (towards brighter magnitudes and higher break radii) in several photometric diagrams. In scale-free photometric diagrams, simulations and observations overlap and the remnants reproduce the observational trends, so the physical mechanism after antitruncations is highly scalable. We have found novel photometric scaling relations between the characteristic parameters of the antitruncations in real S0s, which are also reproduced by our simulations. The trends in all the photometric planes can be derived from three basic scaling relations that real and simulated Type-III S0s fulfill: h_i \prop R_brkIII, h_o \prop R_brkIII, and mu_brkIII \prop R_brkIII, where h_i and h_o are the scalelenghts of the inner and outer discs, and mu_brkIII and R_brkIII are the surface brightness and radius of the breaks. Mayor mergers provide a feasible mechanism to form realistic antitruncated S0 galaxies (abridged). Published in Astronomy & Astrophysics. 31 pages, 17 figures. Language corrections by the journal included in this new version. Title changed |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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