The tilt of the Fundamental Plane of Early-type galaxies: wavelength dependence

Abstract

The photometric parameters R_e and mu_e of 74 early-type (E+S0+S0a) galaxies in the Coma cluster are derived for the first time in the near IR H band. These are used, coupled with measurements of the central velocity dispersion found in the literature, to determine the H band Fundamental Plane (FP) relation of this cluster. The same procedure is applied to previously available photometric data in the B, V, r, I, and K bands, to perform a multi-wavelength study of the FP. Because systematic uncertainties in the value of the FP parameters are introduced both by the choice of the fitting algorithm, and by the presence of statistical biases connected with the sample selection procedure, we emphasize the importance of deriving the FP parameters in the six photometric bands using an identical fitting algorithm, and appropriate corrections to eliminate the effects of sample incompleteness. We find that the FP mu_e coefficient is stable with wavelength, while the sigma coefficient increases significantly with increasing wavelength, in agreement with an earlier result presented by Pahre & Djorgovski. The slope of the FP relation, although changing with wavelength, never approaches the virial theorem expectation. We also find that the magnitude of the slope change can be entirely explained by the presence of the well known relation between color and magnitude among early-type galaxies. We conclude that the tilt of the Fundamental Plane is significant, and must be due to some form of broken homology among early-type galaxies, while its wavelength dependence derives from whatever mechanism (currently the preferred one is the existence of a mass-metal content sequence) produces the color-magnitude relation in those galaxies.

8 pages, 7 figures, 6 tables; table 3 should be printed in landscape mode, and inserted into the text. Accepted for publication in MNRAS

Cited by in corpus (48)

• The Atlas3D project - XV. Benchmark for early-type galaxies scaling relations from 260 dynamical models: mass-to-light ratio, dark matter, Fundamental Plane and Mass Plane
• Structure and Kinematics of Early-Type Galaxies from Integral-Field Spectroscopy
• Stellar Population Diagnostics of Elliptical Galaxy Formation
• GALICS I: A hybrid N-body semi-analytic model of hierarchical galaxy formation
• Early-type galaxies in the SDSS. I. The sample
• The 3-D structure of the Virgo cluster from H band Fundamental Plane and Tully-Fisher distance determinations
• The Sloan Lens ACS Survey. VII. Elliptical Galaxy Scaling Laws from Direct Observational Mass Measurements
• Central Structural Parameters of Early-Type Galaxies as Viewed with HST/NICMOS
• Photo-Chemical Evolution of Elliptical Galaxies I. The high-redshift formation scenario
• The Evolution of a Mass-Selected Sample of Early-Type Field Galaxies
• Central mass-to-light ratios and dark matter fractions in early-type galaxies
• Dissecting the Red Sequence - III. Mass-to-Light Variations in 3D Fundamental Plane Space
• The properties of field elliptical galaxies at intermediate redshift. III: the Fundamental Plane and the evolution of stellar populations from z~0.4 to z=0
• The 6dF Galaxy Survey: The Near-Infrared Fundamental Plane of Early-Type Galaxies
• Redshift-distance Survey of Early-type Galaxies: the ENEARc Cluster Sample
• The Fundamental Plane of Early Type Galaxies in Nearby Clusters from the WINGS Database
• SPIDER II - The Fundamental Plane of Early-type Galaxies in grizYJHK
• Photometric properties and origin of bulges in SB0 galaxies
• Environmental Effects in the Structural Parameters of Galaxies in the Coma Cluster
• On the Invariant Distribution of Galaxies in the re--mie plane out to z = 0.64
• Velocity Dispersion, Size, Sérsic Index and $D_{n}4000$: The Scaling of Stellar Mass with Dynamical Mass for Quiescent Galaxies
• SPIDER X - Environmental effects in central and satellite early-type galaxies through the stellar fossil record
• The SDSS-UKIDSS Fundamental Plane of Early-type Galaxies
• Calibrating the fundamental plane with SDSS DR8 data
• 1.65 micron (H-band) surface photometry of galaxies. IX: photometric and structural properties of galaxies
• Optical and Near-Infrared Structural Properties of Cluster Galaxies at $z\sim 0.3$
• The scaling relations of galaxy clusters and their dark matter halos
• The Faber-Jackson relation for early-type galaxies: Dependence on the magnitude range
• Toward Understanding the origin of the Fundamental Plane for Early-Type Galaxies
• Redshift-distance Survey of Early-type Galaxies: The D_n-sigma Relation
• MaNGA DynPop -- III. Stellar dynamics versus stellar population relations in 6000 early-type and spiral galaxies: Fundamental Plane, mass-to-light ratios, total density slopes, and dark matter fractions
• The Mid-Infrared Fundamental Plane of Early-Type Galaxies
• The Fundamental Planes of E+A galaxies and GALEX UV-excess early-type galaxies: Revealing their intimate connection
• The Fundamental Plane of QSOs and the Relationship Between Host and Nucleus
• 1.65 micron H-band Surface Photometry of Galaxies. X: Structural and Dynamical Properties of Elliptical Galaxies
• The hybrid solution for the Fundamental Plane
• Projection effects on the FP thickness: a Monte-Carlo exploration
• Fundamental Plane of BOSS galaxies: Correlations with galaxy properties, density field and impact on RSD measurements
• The intrinsic dispersion of the Faber-Jackson relation for early-type galaxies as function of the mass and redshift
• The contribution of rotational velocity to the FP of elliptical galaxies
• A Precise Benchmark for Cluster Scaling Relations: Fundamental Plane, Mass Plane and IMF in the Coma Cluster from Dynamical Models
• 1.65 micron (H-band) surface photometry of galaxies. VIII: the near-IR k-space at z=0
• The Fundamental Plane of Quasars
• New clues to the evolution of dwarf early-type galaxies
• Influence of Cooled Interstellar Gas on the Fundamental Plane for Elliptical Galaxies
• Moderate Galaxy-Galaxy Lensing
• Scaling Relations in Dissipationless Spiral-like Galaxy Mergers
• Dynamical Mass Determinations and Scaling Relations of Early-Type Galaxies