2023MNRAS.522.3318D -
Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 522, 3318-3336 (2023/July-1)
The many reasons that the rotation curves of low-mass galaxies can fail as tracers of their matter distributions.
DOWNING E.R. and OMAN K.A.
Abstract (from CDS):
It is routinely assumed that galaxy rotation curves are equal to their circular velocity curves (modulo some corrections) such that they are good dynamical mass tracers. We take a visualization-driven approach to exploring the limits of the validity of this assumption for a sample of 33 low-mass galaxies ($60\lt v_\mathrm{max}/\mathrm{km}\, \mathrm{s}^{-1}\lt 120$ ) from the APOSTLE suite of cosmological hydrodynamical simulations. Only three of these have rotation curves nearly equal to their circular velocity curves at z = 0, the rest are undergoing a wide variety of dynamical perturbations. We use our visualizations to guide an assessment of how many galaxies are likely to be strongly perturbed by processes in several categories: mergers/interactions (affecting 6/33 galaxies), bulk radial gas inflows (19/33), vertical gas outflows (15/33), distortions driven by a non-spherical DM halo (17/33), warps (8/33), and winds due to motion through the intergalactic medium (5/33). Most galaxies fall into more than one of these categories; only 5/33 are not in any of them. The sum of these effects leads to an underestimation of the low-velocity slope of the baryonic Tully-Fisher relation (α ∼ 3.1 instead of α ∼ 3.9, where Mbar ∝ vα) that is difficult to avoid, and could plausibly be the source of a significant portion of the observed diversity in low-mass galaxy rotation curve shapes.
Abstract Copyright:
© 2023 The Author(s) Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society.
Journal keyword(s):
galaxies: dwarf - galaxies: kinematics and dynamics - dark matter
Simbad objects:
3
Full paper
View the references in ADS
To bookmark this query, right click on this link: simbad:2023MNRAS.522.3318D and select 'bookmark this link' or equivalent in the popup menu