Planetary nebulae in the elliptical galaxy NGC 4649 (M 60): kinematics and distance redetermination

Abstract

Using a slitless spectroscopy method with (a) the 8.2 m Subaru telescope and its FOCAS Cassegrain spectrograph, and (b) the ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT) unit 1 (Antu) and its FORS2 Cassegrain spectrograph, we have detected 326 planetary nebulae (PNs) in the giant Virgo elliptical galaxy NGC 4649 (M 60), and we have measured their radial velocities. After rejecting some PNs more likely to belong to the companion galaxy NGC 4647, we have built a catalog with kinematic information for 298 PNs in M 60. Using these radial velocities we have concluded that they support the presence of a dark matter halo around M 60. Based on an isotropic, two-component Hernquist model, we estimate the dark matter halo mass within 3$R_{\mathrm{e}}$ to be 4$\times 10^{11}{M}_{\odot }$, which is almost one half of the total mass of about $10^{12}{M}_{\odot }$ within 3$R_{\mathrm{e}}$. This total mass is similar to that estimated from globular cluster, XMM-Newton and Chandra observations. The dark matter becomes dominant outside. More detailed dynamical modeling of the PN data is being published in a companion paper. We have also measured the $m$(5007) magnitudes of many of these PNs, and built a statistically complete sample of 218 PNs. The resulting PN luminosity function (PNLF) was used to estimate a distance modulus of 30.7$\pm$0.2 mag, equivalent to 14$\pm$1 Mpc. This confirms an earlier PNLF distance measurement, based on a much smaller sample. The PNLF distance modulus remains smaller than the surface brightness fluctuation (SBF) distance modulus by 0.4 mag.

Accepted for publication in ApJ; 14 figures

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• Galaxy Masses
• The SAGES Legacy Unifying Globulars and GalaxieS Survey (SLUGGS): Sample definition, methods, and initial results
• The SLUGGS Survey: Wide-field Stellar Kinematics of Early-type Galaxies
• Elliptical galaxy masses out to five effective radii: the realm of dark matter
• The extended Planetary Nebula Spectrograph (ePN.S) early-type galaxy survey. The kinematic diversity of stellar halos and the relation between halo transition scale and stellar mass
• Signatures of accretion events in the halos of early-type galaxies from comparing PNe and GCs kinematics
• The Planetary Nebula Luminosity Function at the Dawn of Gaia
• Planetary Nebula Luminosity Function distances for 19 galaxies observed by PHANGS-MUSE
• The Two-Dimensional Spatial Distributions of the Globular Clusters and Low-Mass X-Ray Binaries of NGC4649
• A SLUGGS and Gemini/GMOS combined study of the elliptical galaxy M60: wide-field photometry and kinematics of the globular cluster system
• Revised Simulations of the Planetary Nebulae Luminosity Function
• Spatial Structures In the Globular Cluster Distribution of the Ten Brightest Virgo Galaxies
• Resolving the Discrepancy of Distance to M60, a Giant Elliptical Galaxy in Virgo
• Dark matter inside early-type galaxies as function of mass and redshift
• How much dark matter is there inside early-type galaxies?
• The massive elliptical galaxy NGC 4649 from the perspective of extended gravity
• Dark matter in massive galaxies
• Kinematic study of planetary nebulae in NGC 6822
• The Planetary Nebulae Luminosity Function (PNLF): current perspectives
• Planetary Nebulae Populations in External Galaxies