Dust penetrated arm classes: insight from rising and falling rotation curves
Astrophysics
2016-01-27 v1
Abstract
We present near-infrared K-band images of 15 galaxies. We have performed a Fourier analysis on the spiral structure of these galaxies in order to determine their pitch angles and dust-penetrated arm classes. We have also obtained rotation curve data for these galaxies and calculated their shear rates. We show that there is a correlation between pitch angle and shear rate and conclude that the main determinant of pitch angle is the mass distribution within the galaxy. This correlation provides a physical basis for the dust-penetrated classification scheme of Block & Puerari (1999).
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0406492,
title = {Dust penetrated arm classes: insight from rising and falling rotation curves},
author = {Marc S. Seigar and David L. Block and Ivanio Puerari},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0406492},
year = {2016}
}
Comments
9 pages, 5 figures, to appear in proceeding to a conference entitled "Penetrating Bars Through Masks of Cosmic Dust: The Hubble Tuning Fork Strikes A New Note"