Wide-field study of the peculiar globular cluster system hosted by the field lenticular NGC 1172
arXiv:2009.11375 · doi:10.1093/mnras/staa2967
Abstract
We present a wide-field study of the globular cluster system (GCS) of the field lenticular galaxy NGC 1172, based on observations from GMOS/Gemini (optical), FourStar/Magellan (NIR), and archival data from ACS/HST (optical). This analysis covers the full extension of the GCS, and results in a value of specific frequency (S_N=8.6 +/- 1.5) peculiarly high for an intermediate-mass galaxy in a low-density environment such as this one. We find that the GCS appears to be bimodal, although the colour distribution is narrow and does not allow for an accurate separation of the subpopulations. However, the combination of optical and NIR filters allows us to obtain an estimation of the metallicity distribution based on the photometry, which supports bimodality. We conclude that the presence of a large fraction of metal-poor globular clusters (GCs) and the high specific frequency point to NGC 1172 having accreted a significant amount of GCs from low-mass satellites in the past.
12 pages, 13 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS
References in corpus (23)
- The ACS Virgo Cluster Survey. XII. The Luminosity Function of Globular Clusters in Early Type Galaxies
- Explaining the Color Distributions of Globular Cluster Systems in Elliptical Galaxies
- Galactic Dark Matter Halos and Globular Cluster Populations. III: Extension to Extreme Environments
- Large-scale study of the NGC 1399 globular cluster system in Fornax
- Dark Matter Halos in Galaxies and Globular Cluster Populations
- Globular Cluster Systems in Brightest Cluster Galaxies: A Near-Universal Luminosity Function?
- The connection between globular cluster systems and their host galaxy and environment: a case study of the isolated elliptical NGC 821
- Globular Cluster Systems in Brightest Cluster Galaxies. III: Beyond Bimodality
- The star formation history of galaxies: the role of galaxy mass, morphology and environment
- Dynamical Evolution of Globular Cluster Systems formed in Galaxy Mergers: Deep HST/ACS Imaging of Old and Intermediate-Age Globular Clusters in NGC 3610
- The difference in metallicity distribution functions of halo stars and globular clusters as a function of galaxy type: A tracer of globular cluster formation and evolution
- The Fornax Deep Survey with VST. IX. The catalog of sources in the FDS area, with an example study for globular clusters and background galaxies
- The ACS Fornax Cluster Survey. III. Globular Cluster Specific Frequencies of Early-Type Galaxies
- The complex star cluster system of NGC 1316 (Fornax A)
- Isolated ellipticals and their globular cluster systems III. NGC 2271, NGC 2865, NGC 3962, NGC 4240 and IC 4889
- Globular cluster systems as tracers of the evolutionary history in NGC 3258 and NGC 3268
- New Constraints on Early-Type Galaxy Assembly from Spectroscopic Metallicities of Globular Clusters in M87
- The merger remnant NGC 3610 and its globular cluster system: a large-scale study
- The Next Generation Virgo cluster Survey (NGVS). XXVI. The issues of photometric age and metallicity estimates for globular clusters
- A Wide-field Photometric Survey of Globular Clusters in the Peculiar Early-type Galaxy M85
- A Gemini/GMOS study of the bright elliptical galaxy NGC 3613 and its globular cluster system
- Field/Isolated lenticular galaxies with high values: the case of NGC 4546 and its globular cluster system
- The globular cluster system of the isolated elliptical NGC 6411: An old system in an intermediate-age galaxy?