How Large Are the Bars in Barred Galaxies

By P. Erwin. 2005

168 citations recorded by the source corpus.

I present a study of the sizes (semimajor axes) of bars in disc galaxies, combining a detailed R-band study of 65 S0‐Sb galaxies with the B-band measurements of 70 Sb‐Sd galaxies from Martin (1995). As has been noted before with smaller samples, bars in early-type (S0‐ Sb) galaxies are clearly larger than bars in late-type (Sc‐Sd) galaxies; this is true both for relative sizes (bar length as fraction of isophotal radius R25 or exponential disc scalelength h) and absolute sizes (kpc). S0‐Sab bars extend to ∼1‐10 kpc (mean ∼ 3.3 kpc), ∼0.2‐0.8R 25 (mean ∼ 0.38R 25) and ∼0.5‐2.5h (mean ∼ 1.4h). Late-type bars extend to only ∼0.5‐3.5 kpc, ∼0.05‐0.35R 25 and 0.2‐1.5h; their mean sizes are ∼1.5 kpc, ∼ 0.14R 25 and ∼0.6h .S bg alaxies resemble earlier-type galaxies in terms of bar size relative to h; their smaller R25-relative sizes may be a side effect of higher star formation, which increases R25 but not h. Sbc galaxies form a transition between the early- and late-type regimes. For S0‐Sbc galaxies, bar size correlates well with disc size (both R25 and h); these correlations are stronger than the known correlation with MB. All correlations appear to be weaker or absent for late-type galaxies; in particular, there seems to be no correlation between bar size and either h or MB for Sc‐Sd galaxies. Because bar size scales with disc size and galaxy magnitude for most Hubble types, studies of bar evolution with redshift should select samples with similar distributions of disc size or magnitude (extrapolated to present-day values); otherwise, bar frequencies and sizes could be mis-estimated. Because early-type galaxies tend to have larger bars, resolution-limited studies will preferentially find bars in early-type galaxies (assuming no significant differential evolution in bar sizes). I show that the bars detected in Hubble Space Telescope (HST) nearinfrared(IR) images at z ∼ 1b ySheth et al. have absolute sizes consistent with those in bright, nearby S0‐Sb galaxies. I also compare the sizes of real bars with those produced in simulations and discuss some possible implications for scenarios of secular evolution along the Hubble sequence. Simulations often produce bars as large as (or larger than) those seen in S0‐Sb galaxies, but rarely any as small as those in Sc‐Sd galaxies. Ke yw ords: galaxies: elliptical and lenticular, cD ‐ galaxies: evolution ‐ galaxies: spiral ‐ galaxies: structure.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/7270d2428f75228669c2453f65d6291655e4febf

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In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. J. Trevor Mendel
2. P. Erwin
3. David R. Patton
4. S. Jogee
5. Sara L. Ellison
6. J. Scudder
7. I. Marinova
8. R. Buta

In Instrumentation

1. S. Jogee
2. J. Trevor Mendel
3. David R. Patton
4. Sara L. Ellison
5. J. Scudder
6. M. Pohlen
7. I. Marinova
8. P. Erwin

Citations in the corpus

• THE OUTER DISKS OF EARLY-TYPE GALAXIES. I. SURFACE-BRIGHTNESS PROFILES OF BARRED GALAXIES (2007, methodology): “Using the same approach as Erwin (2005), we find bar sizes of a = 8.5′′ and Lbar = 14′′ for this galaxy, with the bar having a position angle of 127◦.”
• Image decomposition of barred galaxies and AGN hosts (2007, unknown): “4 and by, e.g., Erwin (2005).”
• Bars in Disk-dominated and Bulge-dominated Galaxies at z ~ 0: New Insights from ~3600 SDSS Galaxies (2007, result): “4 (median 0.32), which is consistent with the results of MJ07 and Erwin (2005).”
• THE SINFONI BLACK HOLE SURVEY: THE BLACK HOLE FUNDAMENTAL PLANE REVISITED AND THE PATHS OF (CO)EVOLUTION OF SUPERMASSIVE BLACK HOLES AND BULGES (2016, methodology): “NGC 4151: We take the R−band bulge plus bar plus disk decomposition of Gadotti (2008) and set b = 1 in Table 1 (Erwin 2005).”
• AINUR: Atlas of Images of NUclear Rings (2009, background): “Bars in galaxies with types between 0.1 < T 6 3.0 are longer when scaled withDo (as reported by Elmegreen & Elmegreen 1985; Martin 1995; Regan & Elmegreen 1997; Erwin 2005) although the effect is not as spectacular as when the absolute bar size is used.”
• The population of barred galaxies in the local universe - I. Detection and characterisation of bars (2009, methodology): “…Wozniak et al. 1995; Laine et al. 2002; Marinova & Jogee 2007) or as the radius rPAbar at which the PA changes by 5◦ with respect to the value corresponding to the maximum ellipticity (e.g, Wozniak et al. 1995; Sheth et al. 2003; Erwin & Sparke 2003; Erwin 2005; Michel-Dansac & Wozniak 2006).”
• The structure of galactic disks - Studying late-type spiral galaxies using SDSS (2006, methodology): “Erwin (2005), using HST images, gives 5′′and classifies the galaxy therefore as Type II.o-OLR+ III (with an ’extreme’ OLR break).”
• The impact of gas inflows on star formation rates and metallicities in barred galaxies (2011, background): “It has been suggested that the dependence of SFR enhancement on morphological type may be due to the generally longer, stronger (more elongated) bars in the former (Elmegreen & Elmegreen 1985, 1989; Erwin 2005; Menendez-Delmestre et al. 2007).”
• Characterizing Bars at z ~ 0 in the Optical and NIR: Implications for the Evolution of Barred Disks with Redshift (2006, methodology): “In his empirical study of bar sizes using ellipse fits Erwin (2005) argues that using the P.A. signature to define the bar size provides an upper limit, and that the two measures of bar length are very well correlated.”
• Properties of Bars and Bulges in the Hubble Sequence (2007, background): “There are many optical (Elmegreen & Elmegreen 1985; Martin 1995; Erwin 2005) and infrared (Regan & Elmegreen 1997; Laurikainen, Salo & Rautiainen 2002; Laurikainen, Salo & Buta 2004) studies showing that bars in early-type spirals are longer than bars in late-type spirals.”