Slides for Week 14

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Slides for Week 14 4/28/17 The Discovery of Galaxies • Up to the 1920’s, astronomers were not sure exactly how far away galaxies were, and thus didn’t know how big they are! • “Spiral Nebulae” could be assumed to be inside our own Milky Way galaxy. – Planetary systems in formation? – Strangely shaped clouds? Galaxies and • In 1920, Shapley & Curtis debated the nature of “spiral nebulae” and the size of our Galaxy. (The debate was A “Spiral Nebula” Cosmology eventually settled using standard The Whirlpool Galaxy candles) We now realize that our galaxy is only Spiral Galaxies one of billions of galaxies we can see. • Typically bright, blue in color • Look like pinwheels (sometimes with These galaxies come in three main bar) types: Spiral, Elliptical & Irregular M 100 NGC 300 A Barred Spiral Galaxy with only 2 arms. 1 4/28/17 Elliptical Galaxies Ellipticals are round, not flat like spirals, and come in a wide range of sizes They are typically “red” in color and have less gas and A Spiral Galaxy Seen Edge On dust than spirals. The Coma Galaxy Cluster contains Ellipticals and Spirals Irregular Galaxies •Lack any distinct shape •Are generally smaller than spirals and ellipticals Hubble Tuning Fork Galaxy Classification Lecture Spiral Galaxies (S): Classified according to spiral arms (a,b,c) Tutorial: Page 139-142 and presence of a bar (“B”) Elliptical Galaxies (E): Classified according to shape (E0-E9) • Work with a partner or two • Read directions and answer all questions Irregular Galaxies carefully. Take time to understand it now! (Irr): Basically • Discuss each question and come to a anything funky- consensus answer you all agree on before looking! moving on to the next question. • If you get stuck, ask another group for help. • If you get really stuck, raise your hand and I will come around. 2 4/28/17 Extragalactic Distances Questions: Galaxies are typically millions or billions of light years from our galaxy. • How do we measure the distance to a galaxy? • How do we detect a galaxy’s motion? • How do we measure the mass in a galaxy? Typical distance units: Kly = 1,000 light years Mly = 1,000,000 light years White Dwarf Supernovae Supernovae are Good Standard Candles • Need a standard candle other than Cepheid variable stars: Supernovae! • They are all the • Matter from large companion falls onto a white same dwarf, causing its mass to exceed 1.4 Msun brightness • The resulting explosion is a Type Ia supernova. • They can be Supernovae Types seen at very large distances Type Ia: Exploding White – (1000x farther Dwarf in Binary than Cepheids) Type II: “ordinary” supernovae caused by an exploding massive stars Supernova in galaxy NGC4526 (HST Image) Galaxies in Motion Hubble Law and Distance • Motion of galaxies is measured using the Doppler effect. • Spectrum will be redshifted if it is moving away, The fact that the universe is expanding can be used to determine the distances to galaxies which are far, far away. blueshifted if it is moving toward us. Non-moving galaxy spectrum vr = H0 x d d = vr / H0 If we measure vr we Redshifted Spectrum can calculate the distance. 3 4/28/17 Techniques for Measuring Distances Hubble Law Review (nearby 1. Parallax stars) d = vr / H0 • Measure angle, use d = 1/p (nearest 2. Cepheid method (standard candle) • d = distance to galaxy (Mly) galaxies) • Measure Period, get luminosity • vr = radial velocity of galaxy (km/s) (distant 3. Type Ia Supernovae (standard candle) • H0 = Hubble constant (22 km/s/Mly) galaxies) 4. Hubble’s Law (whole universe!) • Measure velocity Vr . Use: Vr = Ho x D Hubble Law & Expansion Measuring the Mass of Galaxies We can use the Sun’s motion around the center of the Milky Way The greater the mass inside the orbit, the faster the Sun has move around the center. This way we can measure the • Expansion of pool balls. The balls farthest from the mass of the Milky Way and other galaxies. center are moving the fastest. – Velocity is proportional to distance. Rotation Curve Example: Rotation Curve Example: Merry-Go-Rounds Our Solar System • Every part of the merry-go-round “orbits” the center in the same amount of time The period of each planet depends on its distance from the Sun – Kepler’s 3rd Law: P2 = a3 – Inner part moves slow – Planets farther away from the sun go much slower – Outer part moves fast Solid body rotation 4 4/28/17 What does observing the light from However the flat stars in other galaxies tell us? rotation curve tells a different story! The galaxy looks bright at center, so most of the stars are there, so most of the Because there is a flat mass should be at the Light from stars rotation curve there center. Distance from the Galactic Center should be an equal amount Mass curve determined from of mass distributed the rotation curve everywhere throughout the Mass curve Mass galaxy’s disk and halo. determined Mass from Light Distance from the Galactic Center Distance from the Galactic Center Mass of the Milky Way • The mass of the Milky Way is about 400 billion Msun • Stars & Gas we see in the Milky Way can only account for a fraction of the total mass. (~10%!) - What is it? - Why can’t we see it? Dark Matter 5 .
Recommended publications
  • Messier Objects
    Messier Objects From the Stocker Astroscience Center at Florida International University Miami Florida The Messier Project Main contributors: • Daniel Puentes • Steven Revesz • Bobby Martinez Charles Messier • Gabriel Salazar • Riya Gandhi • Dr. James Webb – Director, Stocker Astroscience center • All images reduced and combined using MIRA image processing software. (Mirametrics) What are Messier Objects? • Messier objects are a list of astronomical sources compiled by Charles Messier, an 18th and early 19th century astronomer. He created a list of distracting objects to avoid while comet hunting. This list now contains over 110 objects, many of which are the most famous astronomical bodies known. The list contains planetary nebula, star clusters, and other galaxies. - Bobby Martinez The Telescope The telescope used to take these images is an Astronomical Consultants and Equipment (ACE) 24- inch (0.61-meter) Ritchey-Chretien reflecting telescope. It has a focal ratio of F6.2 and is supported on a structure independent of the building that houses it. It is equipped with a Finger Lakes 1kx1k CCD camera cooled to -30o C at the Cassegrain focus. It is equipped with dual filter wheels, the first containing UBVRI scientific filters and the second RGBL color filters. Messier 1 Found 6,500 light years away in the constellation of Taurus, the Crab Nebula (known as M1) is a supernova remnant. The original supernova that formed the crab nebula was observed by Chinese, Japanese and Arab astronomers in 1054 AD as an incredibly bright “Guest star” which was visible for over twenty-two months. The supernova that produced the Crab Nebula is thought to have been an evolved star roughly ten times more massive than the Sun.
    [Show full text]
  • THE 1000 BRIGHTEST HIPASS GALAXIES: H I PROPERTIES B
    The Astronomical Journal, 128:16–46, 2004 July A # 2004. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved. Printed in U.S.A. THE 1000 BRIGHTEST HIPASS GALAXIES: H i PROPERTIES B. S. Koribalski,1 L. Staveley-Smith,1 V. A. Kilborn,1, 2 S. D. Ryder,3 R. C. Kraan-Korteweg,4 E. V. Ryan-Weber,1, 5 R. D. Ekers,1 H. Jerjen,6 P. A. Henning,7 M. E. Putman,8 M. A. Zwaan,5, 9 W. J. G. de Blok,1,10 M. R. Calabretta,1 M. J. Disney,10 R. F. Minchin,10 R. Bhathal,11 P. J. Boyce,10 M. J. Drinkwater,12 K. C. Freeman,6 B. K. Gibson,2 A. J. Green,13 R. F. Haynes,1 S. Juraszek,13 M. J. Kesteven,1 P. M. Knezek,14 S. Mader,1 M. Marquarding,1 M. Meyer,5 J. R. Mould,15 T. Oosterloo,16 J. O’Brien,1,6 R. M. Price,7 E. M. Sadler,13 A. Schro¨der,17 I. M. Stewart,17 F. Stootman,11 M. Waugh,1, 5 B. E. Warren,1, 6 R. L. Webster,5 and A. E. Wright1 Received 2002 October 30; accepted 2004 April 7 ABSTRACT We present the HIPASS Bright Galaxy Catalog (BGC), which contains the 1000 H i brightest galaxies in the southern sky as obtained from the H i Parkes All-Sky Survey (HIPASS). The selection of the brightest sources is basedontheirHi peak flux density (Speak k116 mJy) as measured from the spatially integrated HIPASS spectrum. 7 ; 10 The derived H i masses range from 10 to 4 10 M .
    [Show full text]
  • Spiral Galaxies, Elliptical Galaxies, Irregular Galaxies, Dwarf Galaxies, Peculiar/Interacting Galalxies Spiral Galaxies
    Lecture 33: Announcements 1) Pick up graded hwk 5. Good job: Jessica, Jessica, and Elizabeth for a 100% score on hwk 5 and the other 25% of the class with an A. 2) Article and homework 7 were posted on class website on Monday (Apr 18) . Due on Mon Apr 25. 3) Reading Assignment for Quiz Wed Apr 27 Ch 23, Cosmic Perspectives: The Beginning of Time 4) Exam moved to Wed May 4 Lecture 33: Galaxy Formation and Evolution Several topics for galaxy evolution have already been covered in Lectures 2, 3, 4,14,15,16. you should refer to your in-class notes for these topics which include: - Types of galaxies (barred spiral, unbarred spirals, ellipticals, irregulars) - The Local Group of Galaxies, The Virgo and Coma Cluster of galaxies - How images of distant galaxies allow us to look back in time - The Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF) - The Doppler blueshift (Lectures 15-16) - Tracing stars, dust, gas via observations at different wavelengths (Lecture15-16). In next lectures, we will cover - Galaxy Classification. The Hubble Sequence - Mapping the Distance of Galaxies - Mapping the Visible Constituents of Galaxies: Stars, Gas, Dust - Understanding Galaxy Formation and Evolution - Galaxy Interactions: Nearby Galaxies, the Milky Way, Distant Galaxies - Mapping the Dark Matter in Galaxies and in the Universe - The Big Bang - Fates of our Universe and Dark Energy Galaxy Classification Galaxy: Collection of few times (108 to 1012) stars orbiting a common center and bound by gravity. Made of gas, stars, dust, dark matter. There are many types of galaxies and they can be classfiied according to different criteria.
    [Show full text]
  • Monthly Newsletter of the Durban Centre - March 2018
    Page 1 Monthly Newsletter of the Durban Centre - March 2018 Page 2 Table of Contents Chairman’s Chatter …...…………………….……….………..….…… 3 Andrew Gray …………………………………………...………………. 5 The Hyades Star Cluster …...………………………….…….……….. 6 At the Eye Piece …………………………………………….….…….... 9 The Cover Image - Antennae Nebula …….……………………….. 11 Galaxy - Part 2 ….………………………………..………………….... 13 Self-Taught Astronomer …………………………………..………… 21 The Month Ahead …..…………………...….…….……………..…… 24 Minutes of the Previous Meeting …………………………….……. 25 Public Viewing Roster …………………………….……….…..……. 26 Pre-loved Telescope Equipment …………………………...……… 28 ASSA Symposium 2018 ………………………...……….…......…… 29 Member Submissions Disclaimer: The views expressed in ‘nDaba are solely those of the writer and are not necessarily the views of the Durban Centre, nor the Editor. All images and content is the work of the respective copyright owner Page 3 Chairman’s Chatter By Mike Hadlow Dear Members, The third month of the year is upon us and already the viewing conditions have been more favourable over the last few nights. Let’s hope it continues and we have clear skies and good viewing for the next five or six months. Our February meeting was well attended, with our main speaker being Dr Matt Hilton from the Astrophysics and Cosmology Research Unit at UKZN who gave us an excellent presentation on gravity waves. We really have to be thankful to Dr Hilton from ACRU UKZN for giving us his time to give us presentations and hope that we can maintain our relationship with ACRU and that we can draw other speakers from his colleagues and other research students! Thanks must also go to Debbie Abel and Piet Strauss for their monthly presentations on NASA and the sky for the following month, respectively.
    [Show full text]
  • Short-Term Dynamical Evolution of Grand-Design Spirals in Barred
    Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 000, 000–000 (0000) Printed 2 October 2018 (MN LATEX style file v2.2) Short-term dynamical evolution of grand-design spirals in barred galaxies Junichi Baba⋆ Earth-Life Science Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology, 2–12–1 Ookayama, Meguro, Tokyo 152–8551, Japan. Accepted 2015 September 22. Received 2015 September 22; in original form 2015 July 30 ABSTRACT We investigate the short-term dynamical evolution of stellar grand-design spiral arms in barred spiral galaxies using a three-dimensional (3D) N-body/hydrodynamic sim- ulation. Similar to previous numerical simulations of unbarred, multiple-arm spirals, we find that grand-design spiral arms in barred galaxies are not stationary, but rather dynamic. This means that the amplitudes, pitch angles, and rotational frequencies of the spiral arms are not constant, but change within a few hundred million years (i.e. the typical rotational period of a galaxy). We also find that the clear grand-design spi- rals in barred galaxies appear only when the spirals connect with the ends of the bar. Furthermore, we find that the short-term behaviour of spiral arms in the outer regions (R > 1.5–2 bar radius) can be explained by the swing amplification theory and that the effects of the bar are not negligible in the inner regions (R < 1.5–2 bar radius). These results suggest that, although grand-design spiral arms in barred galaxies are affected by the stellar bar, the grand-design spiral arms essentially originate not as bar-driven stationary density waves, but rather as self-excited dynamic patterns.
    [Show full text]
  • I. Big Bang II. Galaxies and Clusters III. Milky Way Galaxy IV. Stars and ConstellaOns I
    The Big Bang and the Structure of the Universe I. Big Bang II. Galaxies and Clusters III. Milky Way Galaxy IV. Stars and Constellaons I. The Big Bang and the Origin of the Universe The Big Bang is the prevailing theory for the formaon of our universe. The theory states that the Universe was in a high density state and then began to expand. The state of the Universe before the expansion is commonly referred to as a singularity (a locaon or state where the properes used to measure gravitaonal field become infinite). The best determinaon of when the Universe inially began to expand (inflaon) is 13.77 billion years ago. NASA/WMAP This is a common arst concepon of the expansion and evoluon (in me and space) of the Universe. NASA / WMAP Science Team This image shows the cosmic microwave background radiaon in our Universe – “echo” of the Big Bang. This is the oldest light in the Universe. In the microwave poron of the electromagnec spectrum, this corresponds to a temperature of ~2.7K and is the same in all direcons. The temperature is color coded and varies by only ±0.0002K. This radiaon represents the thermal radiaon le over from the period aer the Big Bang when normal maer formed. One consequence of the expanding Universe and the immense distances is that the further an object, the further back in me you are viewing. Since light travels at a finite speed, the distance to an object indicates how far back in me you are viewing. For example, it is easy to view the Andromeda galaxy form Earth.
    [Show full text]
  • Star Formation Efficiency in the Barred Spiral Galaxy Ngc 4303
    The Astrophysical Journal, 721:383–394, 2010 September 20 doi:10.1088/0004-637X/721/1/383 C 2010. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. STAR FORMATION EFFICIENCY IN THE BARRED SPIRAL GALAXY NGC 4303 Rieko Momose1,2, Sachiko K. Okumura2, Jin Koda3,4, and Tsuyoshi Sawada2 1 Department of Astronomy, University of Tokyo, Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan; [email protected] 2 National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, Mitaka, Tokyo 181-8588, Japan; [email protected], [email protected] 3 Department of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794-3800, USA; [email protected] 4 California Institute of Technology, MS 105-24, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA Received 2010 March 28; accepted 2010 July 22; published 2010 August 27 ABSTRACT We present new 12CO (J = 1−0) observations of the barred galaxy NGC 4303 using the Nobeyama 45 m telescope (NRO45) and the Combined Array for Research in Millimeter-wave Astronomy (CARMA). The Hα images of barred spiral galaxies often show active star formation in spiral arms, but less so in bars. We quantify the difference by measuring star formation rate (SFR) and star formation efficiency (SFE) at a scale where local star formation is spatially resolved. Our CO map covers the central 2.3 region of the galaxy; the combination of NRO45 and CARMA provides a high fidelity image, enabling accurate measurements of molecular gas surface density. We find that SFR and SFE are twice as high in the spiral arms as in the bar.
    [Show full text]
  • Downloaded from Flexiprep.Com NCERT Class 6 Geography
    9/22/2021 NCERT Class 6 Geography Chapter 1: Earth in Solar System Complete Notes Part 1- FlexiPrep FlexiPrep NCERT Class 6 Geography Chapter 1: Earth in Solar System Complete Notes Part 1 (For CBSE, ICSE, IAS, NET, NRA 2022) Doorsteptutor material for CBSE/Class-6 is prepared by world's top subject experts: get questions, notes, tests, video lectures and more- for all subjects of CBSE/Class-6. Get the Video tutorial on this topic at: Starting with Solar System, Solar is derived from “Sol” which means in roman “Sungod” . As a result all the words from ‘solar’ means related to sun. What will study in this chapter is solar system and earth in particular. Many galaxy make universe. The galaxy in which we live is Milky way and we call it Akashganga. Solar system is part of Milky Way. Galaxy Gravitationally bound system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, and dark matter is known as galaxy Example, Milky Way (contains Solar System) March 2016, Most distant galaxy discovered was GN-z11 Hubble՚s Classification: Hubble՚s classification is to used identified various types of galaxy. Hubble՚s classified three broad category for galaxies as: Elliptical (E) Spiral (S) : Andromeda & Sombrero (unbarred) Lenticular Spiral galaxy: Spiral Galaxy is most common galaxy and Andromeda is most common example of spiral galaxy. Sombrero is (unbarred) spiral galaxy. Spiral galaxy is divided in two parts Unbarred & Barred spiral galaxy. Celestial Bodies (Sun, Moon, Objects in Night Sky) Celestial bodies include sun, moon and objects in night sky. ©FlexiPrep. Report ©violations @https://tips.fbi.gov/ 1 of 2 9/22/2021 NCERT Class 6 Geography Chapter 1: Earth in Solar System Complete Notes Part 1- FlexiPrep Celestial bodies here, ©FlexiPrep.
    [Show full text]
  • The European Space Agency
    Teachers Notes Booklet 6: Galaxies and the Expanding Universe Page 1 of 18 The European Space Agency The European Space Agency (ESA) was formed on 31 May 1975. It currently has 17 Member States: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland & United Kingdom. The ESA Science Programme currently contains the following active missions: Venus Express – an exploration of our Cluster – a four spacecraft mission to sister planet. investigate interactions between the Rosetta – first mission to fly alongside Sun and the Earth's magnetosphere and land on a comet XMM-Newton – an X-ray telescope Double Star – joint mission with the helping to solve cosmic mysteries Chinese to study the effect of the Sun Cassini-Huygens – a joint ESA/NASA on the Earth’s environment mission to investigate Saturn and its SMART-1 – Europe’s first mission to moon Titan, with ESA's Huygens probe the Moon, which will test solar-electric SOHO - new views of the Sun's propulsion in flight, a key technology for atmosphere and interior future deep-space missions Hubble Space Telescope – world's Mars Express - Europe's first mission most important and successful orbital to Mars consisting of an orbital platform observatory searching for water and life on the Ulysses – the first spacecraft to planet investigate the polar regions around the INTEGRAL – first space observatory to Sun simultaneously observe celestial objects in gamma rays, X-rays and visible light Details on all these missions and others can be found at - http://sci.esa.int. Prepared by Anne Brumfitt Content Advisor Chris Lawton Science Editor, Content Advisor, Web Integration & Booklet Design Karen O'Flaherty Science Editor & Content Advisor Jo Turner Content Writer © 2005 European Space Agency Teachers Notes Booklet 6: Galaxies and the Expanding Universe Page 2 of 18 Booklet 6 – Galaxies and the Expanding Universe Contents 6.1 Structure of the Milky Way .............................................
    [Show full text]
  • Automated Quantification of Arbitrary Arm-Segment Structure in Spiral Galaxies
    UC Irvine UC Irvine Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Automated Quantification of Arbitrary Arm-Segment Structure in Spiral Galaxies Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0fv151p6 Author Davis, Darren Robert Publication Date 2014 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, IRVINE Automated Quantification of Arbitrary Arm-Segment Structure in Spiral Galaxies DISSERTATION submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Computer Science by Darren Robert Davis Dissertation Committee: Professor Wayne Hayes, Chair Professor Deva Ramanan Professor Aaron Barth 2014 c 2014 Darren Robert Davis TABLE OF CONTENTS Page LIST OF FIGURES iv LIST OF TABLES vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS viii CURRICULUM VITAE xi ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION xiii 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Background . 1 1.2 Uses of Spiral Structure Information . 3 1.3 Primary Contributions . 7 2 Related Work 10 2.1 Morphological Classification . 10 2.2 Bulge, Disk, and Bar Fitting . 12 2.3 Spiral Arm Pitch Angle Measurement . 13 2.4 Automated Fitting of Restricted Spiral Models . 15 2.5 Human-Interactive Detailed Spiral Fitting . 17 2.6 Large-Scale Manual Determination of Spiral Galaxy Structure . 19 2.7 An Unfulfilled Need for Automated Fitting of General Spiral Structure . 20 3 Extracting Spiral Arm-Segment Structure 22 3.1 Representing Arm-Segment Structure . 22 3.2 Image Brightness Transformation . 31 3.3 Image Standardization . 35 3.4 Foreground Star Removal . 41 3.5 Orientation Field Generation . 48 3.5.1 Determining the Orientation Field Vectors . 49 3.5.2 Enhancing Sensitivity to Spiral Arms via the Unsharp Mask .
    [Show full text]
  • Properties of the Photometric Components of Lenticular Galaxies
    Hindawi Publishing Corporation Advances in Astronomy Volume 2012, Article ID 382674, 35 pages doi:10.1155/2012/382674 Review Article Properties of the Photometric Components of Lenticular Galaxies J. Alfonso L. Aguerri Instituto de Astrof´ısica de Canarias, C/ V´ıa Lactea´ s/n, 38200 La Laguna, Spain Correspondence should be addressed to J. Alfonso L. Aguerri, [email protected] Received 1 October 2011; Revised 12 February 2012; Accepted 31 March 2012 Academic Editor: Elias Brinks Copyright © 2012 J. Alfonso L. Aguerri. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. After almost one century since their definition, the origin of lenticular galaxies is still a matter of debate. Several formation processes have been proposed in order to explain the wide variety of their observational properties. These properties could indicate that the class of lenticulars is a family formed by galaxies with different formations and evolutions. Here I review the main observational properties of the photometric components of lenticular galaxies reported in recent decades. I revise the main processes proposed in order to explain their origin and evolution. I also explain the different properties of the lenticular galaxies that have evolved through each of these formation processes. A unique opportunity for understanding the origin of S0 galaxies will shortly be forthcoming. This is due to the morphological classifications of large galaxy samples that have recently been published. These classifications have given us our first ever opportunity to study large samples of lenticulars within a wide range of masses and located in a great variety of environments.
    [Show full text]
  • The AIMSS Project – I. Bridging the Star Cluster–Galaxy Divide †‡§¶
    MNRAS 443, 1151–1172 (2014) doi:10.1093/mnras/stu1186 ? The AIMSS Project – I. Bridging the star cluster–galaxy divide †‡§¶ Mark A. Norris,1,2k Sheila J. Kannappan,2 Duncan A. Forbes,3 Aaron J. Romanowsky,4,5 Jean P. Brodie,5 Favio Raul´ Faifer,6,7 Avon Huxor,8 Claudia Maraston,9 Amanda J. Moffett,2 Samantha J. Penny,10 Vincenzo Pota,3 Anal´ıa Smith-Castelli,6,7 Jay Strader,11 David Bradley,2 Kathleen D. Eckert,2 Dora Fohring,12,13 JoEllen McBride,2 David V. Stark2 and Ovidiu Vaduvescu12 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article-abstract/443/2/1151/1058316 by guest on 04 September 2019 Affiliations are listed at the end of the paper Accepted 2014 June 16. Received 2014 May 13; in original form 2014 January 27 ABSTRACT We describe the structural and kinematic properties of the first compact stellar systems dis- covered by the Archive of Intermediate Mass Stellar Systems project. These spectroscopically 6 confirmed objects have sizes (∼6 < Re [pc] < 500) and masses (∼2 × 10 < M∗/M¯ < 6 × 109) spanning the range of massive globular clusters, ultracompact dwarfs (UCDs) and compact elliptical galaxies (cEs), completely filling the gap between star clusters and galax- ies. Several objects are close analogues to the prototypical cE, M32. These objects, which are more massive than previously discovered UCDs of the same size, further call into question the existence of a tight mass–size trend for compact stellar systems, while simultaneously strengthening the case for a universal ‘zone of avoidance’ for dynamically hot stellar systems in the mass–size plane.
    [Show full text]