NGC 4102: High Resolution Infrared Observations of a Nuclear Starburst Ring
Abstract
The composite galaxy NGC 4102 hosts a LINER nucleus and a starburst. We mapped NGC 4102 in the 12.8 micron line of [NeII], using the echelon spectrometer TEXES on the NASA IRTF, to obtain a data cube with 1.5" spatial and 25 km/s spectral, resolution. Combining near-infrared, radio, and the [NeII] data shows that the extinction to the starburst is substantial, more than 2 magnitudes at K band, and that the neon abundance is less than half solar. We find that the star formation in the nuclear region is confined to a rotating ring or disk of 4.3" (~300 pc) diameter, inside the Inner Lindblad Resonance. This region is an intense concentration of mass, with a dynamical mass of ~3 x 10^9 solar masses, and of star formation. The young stars in the ring produce the [NeII] flux reported by Spitzer for the entire galaxy. The mysterious blue component of line emission detected in the near-infrared is also seen in [NeII]; it is not a normal AGN outflow.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1008.1800,
title = {NGC 4102: High Resolution Infrared Observations of a Nuclear Starburst Ring},
author = {Sara C. Beck and John H. Lacy and Jean L. Turner},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1008.1800},
year = {2015}
}
Comments
submitted to ApJ