English

Is dark matter present in NGC4736? An iterative spectral method for finding mass distribution in spiral galaxies

Astrophysics 2009-09-29 v3

Abstract

An iterative method for reconstructing mass distribution in spiral galaxies using a thin disk approximation is developed. As an example, the method is applied to galaxy NGC 4736; its rotation curve does not allow one to employ a model with a massive spherical halo. We find a global mass distribution in this galaxy (without non-baryonic dark matter) that agrees perfectly with the high resolution rotation curve of the galaxy. This mass distribution is consistent with the II-band luminosity profile with the mean mass-to-light ratio M/LI=1.2M/L_I=1.2, and also agrees with the amount of hydrogen observed in the outermost regions of the galaxy. We predict the total mass of the galaxy to be only 3.43×1010M\sun3.43\times10^{10}M_{\sun}. It is very close to the value predicted by the modified gravity models and much less than the currently accepted value of 5.0×1010M\sun5.0\times10^{10}M_{\sun} (with 70\approx70% of the mass in a dark matter halo).

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0611113,
  title  = {Is dark matter present in NGC4736? An iterative spectral method for finding mass distribution in spiral galaxies},
  author = {Joanna Jalocha and Lukasz Bratek and Marek Kutschera},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0611113},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

in v2 version: 1) changed the reference luminosities of the Sun in different bands - this affects mass-to-light ratio, giving more reliable 1.2 in the I-band, 2) found typos corrected, 3) corrected references to literature, figures and equations 4) text permutations + language corrections, accepted for publication in ApJ, May 2008