Surface brightness and effective radius for elliptical galaxies
Abstract
Seeing convolved two-dimensional de Vaucouleurs profiles have been fitted to digital images of the brightest elliptical galaxies in two nearby groups of galaxies and three clusters of galaxies with redshifts in the range 0.06 to 0.15. The plate material was obtained with RGO electronographic cameras, and the photoelectric calibration of cluster fields was done using list stars in the magnitude range 17-29 mag. The reduction procedure for the plates is described. The linear relation between effective surface brightness and the logarithm of the effective radius, valid for nearby ellipticals, is also found to be valid for the largest and brightest galaxies in rich galactic clusters. The same kind of processes may have been involved in the formation of all ellipticals from cD galaxies in clusters to fainter ellipticals in small groups. It is suggested that the relation between surface brightness and effective radius is not changed by the expected dynamical evolution of the brightest cluster galaxies.
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