An HST/WFPC2 Survey of Bright Young Clusters in M31 III. Structural Parameters
Abstract
Surface brightness profiles for 23 M31 star clusters were measured using images from the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 on the Hubble Space Telescope, and fit to two types of models to determine the clusters' structural properties. The clusters are primarily young (~10^8 yr) and massive (~10^4.5 solar masses), with median half-light radius 7 pc and dissolution times of a few Gyr. The properties of the M31 clusters are comparable to those of clusters of similar age in the Magellanic Clouds. Simulated star clusters are used to derive a conversion from statistical measures of cluster size to half-light radius so that the extragalactic clusters can be compared to young massive clusters in the Milky Way. All three sets of star clusters fall approximately on the same age-size relation. The young M31 clusters are expected to dissolve within a few Gyr and will not survive to become old, globular clusters. However, they do appear to follow the same fundamental plane relations as old clusters; if confirmed with velocity dispersion measurements, this would be a strong indication that the star cluster fundamental plane reflects universal cluster formation conditions.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.0909.4053,
title = {An HST/WFPC2 Survey of Bright Young Clusters in M31 III. Structural Parameters},
author = {P. Barmby and S. Perina and M. Bellazzini and J. G. Cohen and P. W. Hodge and J. P. Huchra and M. Kissler-Patig and T. H. Puzia and J. Strader},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0909.4053},
year = {2011}
}
Comments
AJ in press; 37 pages, 12 figures