Related papers: Dynamical Constraints on the Formation of Elliptic…
A review of the present observational and theoretical status of elliptical galaxies is presented with the aim to clarify whether the monolithic or the hierarchical, is a more viable scenario for the origin of these structures. We describe…
Luminous galaxies and their dark halos are likely to have triaxial shapes. The construction of distribution functions for triaxial systems is a hard problem, due to the existence of only one exact integral of motion, the energy $E$. Even…
A variety of observational approaches have provided evidence for extended halos of dark matter surrounding elliptical galaxies, and for massive dark objects in (some of) their nuclei. What are the properties of the dark halos? How do they…
We have developed a method to construct realistic triaxial dynamical models for elliptical galaxies, allowing us to derive best-fitting parameters, such as the mass-to-light ratio and the black hole mass, and to study the orbital structure.…
Globular clusters are valuable fossil records of the formation and evolution of their host galaxies. The color distribution of elliptical galaxy globular cluster systems indicates an episodic formation history, consistent with a merger…
The last decade of research on elliptical galaxies has produced a wealth of new information concerning both their detailed structure and their global scaling relations. We review the old and new results about isophote shapes and…
A review of elliptical galaxy dynamics, with a focus on nonintegrable models. Topics covered include torus construction; modelling axisymmetric galaxies; triaxiality; collisionless relaxation; and collective instabilities.
How elliptical galaxy dynamics relate to galaxy structure, stellar populations, spiral galaxies and environment are reviewed. The evidence assembled shows that most, if not all, galaxies originally classified as gE contain disks within…
Recent progress in the dynamical analysis of elliptical galaxy kinematics is reviewed. Results reported briefly include (i) the surprisingly uniform anisotropy structure of luminous ellipticals, (ii) their nearly flat (to $\sim 2R_e$)…
Here I present a review of the work done on the presence and effects of chaos in elliptical galaxies plus some recent results we obtained on this subject. The fact that important fractions of the orbits that arise in potentials adequate to…
We construct stable axially symmetric models of elliptical galaxies. The particle density on phase space for these models depends monotonically on the particle energy and on the third component of the angular momentum. They are obtained as…
The halo masses of nearby individual elliptical galaxies can be estimated by using the kinematics of their stars, planetary nebulae, and globular clusters -- ideally in combination. With currently improving coverage of galaxies of ordinary…
This review is focussed on the outer halos of elliptical galaxies. Its emphasis is on (i) planetary nebulae as test particles to trace the stellar kinematics at large radii, (ii) the observed angular momentum in elliptical galaxy halos and…
I give a very brief review of aspects of internal dynamics that affect the global shape of a galaxy, focusing on triaxiality, bars and warps. There is general agreement that large central masses can destroy triaxial shapes, but recent…
The structural properties of elliptical galaxies are consistent with their formation in a merging hierarchy. In this picture, the role of gaseous processes and dissipation decreased with increasing mass creating preferentially rotationally…
Here I review recent work, by other authors and by myself, on some particular topics related to the regular and chaotic motion in elliptical galaxies. I show that it is quite possible to build highly stable triaxial stellar systems that…
We construct numerical models of mildly triaxial elliptical galaxies with central density cusps. Using a technique we call ``adiabatic squeezing'', we begin with a spherical gamma=1 Hernquist model and apply a drag to the velocities of the…
In hierarchical models of galaxy formation, ellipticals form from the merging of disk galaxies drawn together by gravity as their surrounding dark halos coalesce. Using semi-analytic techniques, we are able to follow the merging, star…
Recent work on the dynamics of triaxial stellar systems is reviewed. The motion of boxlike orbits in realistic triaxial potentials is generically stochastic. The degree to which the stochasticity manifests itself in the dynamics depends on…
We present a family of spherical models for elliptical galaxies and bulges consisting of a stellar component and a central black hole. All models in this family share the same stellar density profile, which has a steep central cusp. The…