A new criterion for Bar-Forming Instability in Rapidly Rotating Gaseous and Stellar Systems. II. Nonaxisymmetric Form

Abstract

We have previously introduced the parameter `alpha' as an indicator of stability to m=2 nonaxisymmetric modes in rotating, self-gravitating, axisymmetric, gaseous and stellar systems. This parameter can be written as a function of the total rotational kinetic energy, the total gravitational potential energy, and as a function of the topology/connectedness and the geometric shape of a system. Here we extend the stability criterion to nonaxisymmetric equilibrium systems, such as ellipsoids and elliptical disks and cylinders. We test the validity of this extension by considering predictions for previously published, gaseous and stellar, nonaxisymmetric models. The above formulation and critical values account accurately for the stability properties of m=2 modes in gaseous Riemann S-type ellipsoids (including the Jacobi and Dedekind ellipsoids) and elliptical Riemann disks as well as in stellar elliptical Freeman disks and cylinders: all these systems are dynamically stable except for the stellar elliptical Freeman disks that exhibit a relatively small region of m=2 dynamical instability.

17 pages, postscript, compressed, uuencoded. 10 figures available by anonymous ftp from ftp://asta.pa.uky.edu/shlosman/bar2/ (mget *.ps.Z). To appear in Ap.J.

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