Bibcode
Aguerri, J. A. L.; Balcells, M.; Peletier, R. F.
Referencia bibliográfica
Astronomy and Astrophysics, v.367, p.428-442 (2001)
Fecha de publicación:
2
2001
Revista
Número de citas
184
Número de citas referidas
158
Descripción
Andredakis et al. (cite{r3}) fit Sersic's law mu (r) ~ r1/n
to the bulges of the Balcells & Peletier (cite{r5}) galaxy sample,
and infer that n drops with morphological type T from n ~ 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.