The Cepheid Distance to NGC 5236 (M83) with the ESO Very Large Telescope

By F. Thim, G. Tammann, A. Saha, A. Dolphin, A. Sandage, E. Tolstoy, Lukas Labhardt Astronomisches Institut der Universitaet Basel, Switzerland., N. A. Observatories, The Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington and 3 more. 2003

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Cepheids have been observed in NGC 5236 (M83) using the Antu (Unit Telescope 1) 8.2 m telescope of the ESO Very Large Telescope with the Focal Reducer/Low Dispersion Spectrograph 1. Repeated imaging observations have been made between 2000 January and 2001 July. Images were obtained in 34 epochs in the V band and in six epochs in the I band. The photometry was made with the ROMAFOT reduction package and checked independently with DoPHOT and a modified version of HSTPHOT. Twelve Cepheid candidates have periods ranging between 12 and 55 days. The dereddened distance modulus is adopted to be (m - M)0 = 28.25 ± 0.15, which corresponds to a distance of 4.5 ± 0.3 Mpc. The Cepheid distance of NGC 5253 has been rediscussed and strengthened by its SN 1972E. The mean distance of (m - M)0 = 28.01 ± 0.15 (based on SN 1972E) shows the galaxy to be a close neighbor of M83, suggesting that the two galaxies may have interacted in the past and thus possibly explaining the amorphous morphology of NGC 5253. The distance difference between M83 and NGC 5253 is only 0.5 ± 0.4 Mpc. The projected distance is only ~ 0.15 Mpc. M83 is the principal member of the nearby M83 group containing also, besides NGC 5253, several dwarf members, for five of which tip of the red giant branch distances are available. The adopted group distance of (m - M)0 = 28.28 ± 0.10 (4.5 ± 0.2 Mpc), together with its mean recession velocity of vLG = 249 ± 42 km s-1, shows again the extreme quietness of the local (1-10 Mpc) expansion field. M83 fits onto the local mean Hubble flow line of the velocity-distance relation (with H0~ 60) with no significant deviation, supporting the earlier conclusion that the local velocity expansion field is remarkably cold on a scale of 10 Mpc, contrary to the predictions of the simplest cold dark matter model for large-scale structure. The role of a cosmological constant has been invoked as a possible solution in providing a nearly uniform force field everywhere in the presence of a lumpy galaxy distribution.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation

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Citations in the corpus

Cepheid Calibrations from the Hubble Space Telescope of the Luminosity of Two Recent Type Ia Supernovae and a Redetermination of the Hubble Constant (2004, methodology): “Moreover, in order to compare Cepheids with similar periods free from concerns of a discontinuity in the P-L relation expressed by Tammann&Reindl (2002), we use the Thim et al. (2003) P-L relation, which utilizes the OGLE data for P >10 days.”
An Hα Imaging Survey of Galaxies in the Local 11 Mpc Volume (2004, unknown): “—(1) Cote et al. 1997: Cen A group; (2) Ferrerese et al. 2000; (3) Ferrerese et al. 2000: N1023 group (N925 ceph); (4) Fingerhut et al. 2007; (5) Freedman et al. 2001; (6) Irwin et al. 2007; (7) Karachentsev et al. 2006; (8) Karachentsev et al. 2007; (9) KKH04: Cen A group; (10) KKH04: Crone et al. ”
The Hubble Constant: A Summary of the Hubble Space Telescope Program for the Luminosity Calibration of Type Ia Supernovae by Means of Cepheids (2006, methodology): “It is based on only four calibrators whose Cepheid distances were derived from the LMC P-L relations of Thim et al. (2003), which are a slightly earlier version of those in Paper II, but with (m M )0 ¼ 18:50 and including a metallicity correction from Sakai et al. (2004).”
Recent Star Formation in the Extreme Outer Disk of M83 (2004, methodology): “5) We adopt a distance of 4.5 Mpc to M83 (Thim et al. 2003), thus the ∼ 5′′ GALEX PSF corresponds to a linear scale of 110 pc.”
A VLT study of metal-rich extragalactic H II regions - I. Observations and empirical abundances (2005, unknown): “…09h 45m 38.s8 −31◦ 11′ 28′′ SA(s)c 9.4 41 110 300 NGC 5236 13h 37m 00.s9 −29◦ 51′ 57′′ SAB(s)c 4.5 27 45 395 a Source: NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database. b NGC 1232, NGC 2903, NGC 2997: Lyon/Meudon Extragalactic Database; NGC 1365: Freedman et al. (2001); NGC 5236: Thim et al. (2003). c Source: RC3.”
The Hubble Flow around the Centaurus A/M83 Galaxy Complex (2006, background): “In the CNG it was listed with the Cepheid distance 4:47 0:30Mpc (Thim et al. 2003), which positionsM83 to the foreground of all its companions with TRGB distances.”
A Catalog of Neighboring Galaxies (2004, unknown): “31 38 24 Thim et al. 2003 13 40 18.1......”
Cepheid Distances to SNe Ia Host Galaxies Based on a Revised Photometric Zero Point of the HST WFPC2 and New PL Relations and Metallicity Corrections (2006, methodology): “…of previous studies are found—again on a common zero point—for six galaxies reduced by Freedman et al. (2001; 0:31 0:03mag) and four galaxies reduced byRiess et al. (2005; 0:26 0:07 mag) using the P-L relations of the metalpoor LMC by Udalski et al. (1999) and by Thim et al. (2003), respectively.”