Old stellar counter-rotating components in early-type galaxies from elliptical-spiral mergers

We investigate, by means of numerical simulations, the possibility of forming counter-rotating old stellar components by major mergers between an elliptical and a spiral galaxy. We show that counter-rotation can appear both in dissipative and dissipationless retrograde mergers, and it is mostly associated to the presence of a disk component, which preserves part of its initial spin. In turn, the external regions of the two interacting galaxies acquire part of the orbital angular momentum, due to the action of tidal forces exerted on each galaxy by the companion.Comment: 6 pages, 15 figures. Accepted on Astronomy & Astrophysic

Electrical transport properties of nanostructured ferromagnetic perovskite oxides La_0.67Ca_0.33MnO_3 and La_0.5Sr_0.5CoO_3 at low temperatures (5 K > T >0.3 K) and high magnetic field

We report a comprehensive study of the electrical and magneto-transport properties of nanocrystals of La_0.67Ca_0.33MnO_3 (LCMO) (with size down to 15 nm) and La_0.5Sr_0.5CoO_3 (LSCO) (with size down to 35 nm) in the temperature range 0.3 K to 5 K and magnetic fields upto 14 T. The transport, magnetotransport and non-linear conduction (I-V curves) were analysed using the concept of Spin Polarized Tunnelling in the presence of Coulomb blockade. The activation energy of transport, \Delta, was used to estimate the tunnelling distances and the inverse decay length of the tunnelling wave function (\chi) and the height of the tunnelling barrier (\Phi_B). The magnetotransport data were used to find out the magnetic field dependences of these tunnelling parameters. The data taken over a large magnetic field range allowed us to separate out the MR contributions at low temperatures arising from tunnelling into two distinct contributions. In LCMO, at low magnetic field, the transport and the MR are dominated by the spin polarization, while at higher magnetic field the MR arises from the lowering of the tunnel barrier by the magnetic field leading to an MR that does not saturate even at 14 T. In contrast, in LSCO, which does not have substantial spin polarization, the first contribution at low field is absent, while the second contribution related to the barrier height persists. The idea of inter-grain tunnelling has been validated by direct measurements of the non-linear I-V data in this temperature range and the I-V data was found to be strongly dependent on magnetic field. We made the important observation that a gap like feature (with magnitude ~ E_C, the Coulomb charging energy) shows up in the conductance g(V) at low bias for the systems with smallest nanocrystal size at lowest temperatures (T < 0.7 K). The gap closes as the magnetic field and the temperature are increased.Comment: 13 figure

Two tails in NGC 3656, and the major merger origin of shell and minor axis dust lane ellipticals

I report on the discovery of two faint (~ 26.8 Rmag/arcsec^2) tidal tails around the shell elliptical NGC 3656 (Arp 155). This galaxy had previously been interpreted as a case of accretion, or minor merger. The two tidal tails are inconsistent with a minor merger, and point instead to a disk-disk major merger origin. NGC 3656 extends Toomre's merger sequence toward normal elliptical galaxies, and hints at a major merger origin for shells and minor-axis dust lanes. A dwarf galaxy lies at the tip of one of the tidal tails. A prominent shell, which shows sharp azymuthal color discontinuities, belongs to a rotating dynamical component of young stars which includes the inner dust lane.Comment: 9 pages, 2 plates, 1 figure, uses aaspp.sty, accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Files also available by anonymous ftp at ftp.iac.es, directory ./pub/balcell

A minor-merger origin for inner disks and rings in early-type galaxies

Nuclear disks and rings are frequent galaxy substructures, for a wide range of morphological types (from S0 to Sc). We have investigated the possible minor-merger origin of inner disks and rings in spiral galaxies through collisionless N-body simulations. The models confirm that minor mergers can drive the formation of thin, kinematically-cold structures in the center of galaxies out of satellite material, without requiring the previous formation of a bar. Satellite core particles tend to be deposited in circular orbits in the central potential, due to the strong circularization experienced by the satellite orbit through dynamical friction. The material of the satellite core reaches the remnant center if satellites are dense or massive, building up a thin inner disk; whereas it is fully disrupted before reaching the center in the case of low-mass satellites, creating an inner ring instead.Comment: 2 pages, 2 figures, Proceedings of the conference "Hunting for the Dark: The Hidden Side of Galaxy Formation", held in Malta, 19-23 Oct. 2009, ed. V. Debattista and C. C. Popescu, AIP Conf. Ser., in pres

Nuclear Components in the Bulges of Disk Galaxies

By combining surface brightness profiles from images taken in the HST/NICMOS F160W and ground-based (GB) $K$ bands, we have obtained NIR profiles for a well studied sample of inclined disk galaxies, spanning radial ranges from 20 pc to a few kpc. We fit PSF-convolved Sersic-plus-exponential laws to the profiles, and compare the results with the fits to the ground-based data alone. HST profiles show light excesses over the best-fit Sersic law in the inner ~1 arcsec. This is often as a result of inner power-law cusps similar to the inner profiles of intermediate-luminosity elliptical galaxies.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures. Poster paper to "The Central kpc of Starbursts and AGN: the La Palma connection'', Eds. J.H. Knapen, J.E. Beckman, I. Shlosman and T.J. Mahoney, ASP conf. series, in press (2001

Evolution along the sequence of S0 Hubble types induced by dry minor mergers. II - Bulge-disk coupling in the photometric relations through merger-induced internal secular evolution

Galaxy mergers are considered as questionable mechanisms for the evolution of lenticular galaxies (S0's), on the basis that even minor ones induce structural changes that are difficult to reconcile with the strong bulge-disk coupling observed in the photometric scaling relations of S0's. We check if the evolution induced onto S0's by dry intermediate and minor mergers can reproduce their photometric scaling relations, analysing the bulge-disk decompositions of the merger simulations presented in Eliche-Moral et al. (2012). The mergers induce an evolution in the photometric planes compatible with the data of S0's, even in those ones indicating a strong bulge-disk coupling. The mergers drive the formation of the observed photometric relation in some cases, whereas they induce a slight dispersion compatible with data in others. Therefore, this evolutionary mechanism tends to preserve these scaling relations. In those photometric planes where the morphological types segregate, the mergers always induce evolution towards the region populated by S0's. The structural coupling of the bulge and the disk is preserved or reinforced because the mergers trigger internal secular processes in the primary disk that induce significant bulge growth, even although these models do not induce bars. Intermediate and minor mergers can thus be considered as plausible mechanisms for the evolution of S0's attending to their photometric scaling relations, as they can preserve and even strengthen any pre-existing structural bulge-disk coupling, triggering significant internal secular evolution (even in the absence of bars or dissipational effects). This means that it may be difficult to isolate the effects of pure internal secular evolution from those of the merger-driven one in present-day early-type disks (abridged).Comment: Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics, 13 pages, 8 figures. Definitive version after proofs. Added references and corrected typo

Harassment Origin for Kinematic Substructures in Dwarf Elliptical Galaxies?

We have run high resolution N-body models simulating the encounter of a dwarf galaxy with a bright elliptical galaxy. The dwarf absorbs orbital angular momentum and shows counter-rotating features in the external regions of the galaxy. To explain the core-envelope kinematic decoupling observed in some dwarf galaxies in high-density environments requires nearly head-on collisions and very little dark matter bound to the dwarf. These kinematic structures appear under rather restrictive conditions. As a consequence, in a cluster like Virgo ~1% of dwarf galaxies may present counter-rotation formed by harassment.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figures; Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysic

Growth of Galactic Bulges by Mergers: I. Dense Satellites

Andredakis, Peletier & Balcells (1995) fit Sersic's law $\mu(r) \sim r^{1/n}$ to the bulges of the Balcells & Peletier (1994) galaxy sample, and infer that $n$ drops with morphological type T from $n \approx$ 4--6 for S0 to $n=1$ (exponential) for Sc's. We use collisionless N body simulations to test the assumption that initially the surface brightness profiles of all bulges were exponential, and that the steepening of the profiles toward the early-types is due to satellite accretion. The results are positive. After the accretion of a satellite, bulge-disk fits show that the bulge grows and that the bulge profile index $n$ increases proportional to the satellite mass. For a satellite as massive as the bulge, $n$ rises from 1 to 4. We present kinematic diagnostics on the remnants and disk thickening. The latter suggests that the bulge growth must have occurred before the last formation of a thin disk in the galaxy. The thick disks created by the merger are reminiscent of thick disks seen in early-type edge-on galaxies. The efficiency of the process suggests that present day bulges of late-type spirals showing exponential profiles cannot have grown significantly by collisionless mergers.Comment: 10 figures (8 poscript and 2 gif). accepted for publication in A&