4.7 Article

HOBBY-EBERLY TELESCOPE OBSERVATIONS OF THE DARK HALO IN NGC 821

Journal

ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL
Volume 716, Issue 1, Pages 370-383

Publisher

IOP PUBLISHING LTD
DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/716/1/370

Keywords

dark matter; galaxies: elliptical and lenticular, cD; galaxies: halos; galaxies: individual (NGC 821); galaxies: kinematics and dynamics

Funding

  1. Texas Advanced Research Program [003658-0243-2001]
  2. NSF-CAREER [AST03-49095]
  3. Pennsylvania State University
  4. Stanford University
  5. Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen
  6. Georg-August-Universitat Gottingen
  7. University of Texas at Austin
  8. Division Of Astronomical Sciences
  9. Direct For Mathematical & Physical Scien [0908639] Funding Source: National Science Foundation

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We present stellar line-of-sight velocity distributions (LOSVDs) of elliptical galaxy NGC 821 obtained to approximately 100 '' (over two effective radii) with long-slit spectroscopy from the Hobby-Eberly Telescope. Our measured stellar LOSVDs are larger than the planetary nebulae measurements at similar radii. We fit axisymmetric orbit-superposition models with a range of dark halo density profiles, including two-dimensional kinematics at smaller radii from SAURON data. Within our assumptions, the best-fitted model gives a total enclosed mass of 2.0 x 10(11) M(circle dot) within 100 '', with an accuracy of 2%; this mass is equally divided between halo and stars. At 1 R(e), the best-fitted dark matter halo accounts for 13% of the total mass in the galaxy. This dark halo is inconsistent with previous claims of little to no dark matter halo in this galaxy from planetary nebula measurements. We find that a power-law dark halo with a slope 0.1 is the best-fitted model; both the no dark halo and Navarro-Frenk-White models are worse fits at a greater than 99% confidence level. NGC 821 does not appear to have the expected dark halo density profile. The internal moments of the stellar velocity distribution show that the model with no dark halo is radially anisotropic at small radii and tangentially isotropic at large radii, while the best-fitted halo models are slightly radially anisotropic at all radii. We test the potential effects of model smoothing and find that there are no effects on our results within the errors. Finally, we run models using the planetary nebula kinematics and assuming our best-fitted halos and find that the planetary nebulae require radial orbits throughout the galaxy.

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