English

The Coexistence of Classical Bulges, Pseudobulges, and Supermassive Black Holes

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics 2010-02-09 v1

Abstract

Some S0 and early-type spiral galaxies possess "composite bulges"; in these galaxies, the photometric bulge -- the central stellar light in excess of the disk light -- is composed of both a "(disky) pseudobulge", with a flattened, disklike morphology and relatively cool stellar kinematics, and a rounder, kinematically hot "classical bulge" embedded within. I speculate that supermassive black holes (SMBH) in such galaxies may correlate with the classical-bulge component only, and not with the pseudobulge component; preliminary comparisons with SMBH masses appear to support this hypothesis.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1002.1445,
  title  = {The Coexistence of Classical Bulges, Pseudobulges, and Supermassive Black Holes},
  author = {Peter Erwin},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1002.1445},
  year   = {2010}
}

Comments

LaTeX, 4 pages, 2 PDF figures. To appear in the proceedings of "The Monster's Fiery Breath: Feedback in Galaxies, Groups, and Clusters", eds. Sebastian Heinz and Eric Wilcots (AIP conference series)