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Title:
Is the initial mass function of low surface brightness galaxies dominated by low-mass stars?
Authors:
Lee, Hyun-chul; Gibson, Brad K.; Flynn, Chris; Kawata, Daisuke; Beasley, Michael A.
Affiliation:
AA(Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing, Swinburne University, Mail no. 31, PO Box 218, Hawthorn, Victoria 3122, Australia; Centre for Space Astrophysics, Yonsei University, 134 Shinchon, Seodaemoon, Seoul 120-749, South Korea), AB(Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing, Swinburne University, Mail no. 31, PO Box 218, Hawthorn, Victoria 3122, Australia), AC(Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing, Swinburne University, Mail no. 31, PO Box 218, Hawthorn, Victoria 3122, Australia; Tuorla Observatory, Väisäläntie 20, FIN-21500 Piikkiö, Finland), AD(Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing, Swinburne University, Mail no. 31, PO Box 218, Hawthorn, Victoria 3122, Australia), AE(Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing, Swinburne University, Mail no. 31, PO Box 218, Hawthorn, Victoria 3122, Australia; Lick Observatory, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA)
Publication:
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Volume 353, Issue 1, pp. 113-117. (MNRAS Homepage)
Publication Date:
09/2004
Origin:
MNRAS
MNRAS Keywords:
stars: luminosity function, mass function, galaxies: fundamental parameters, galaxies: stellar content
DOI:
10.1111/j.1365-2966.2004.08049.x
Bibliographic Code:
2004MNRAS.353..113L

Abstract

The rotation curves of low surface brightness (LSB) galaxies suggest that they possess significantly higher mass-to-light (M/L) ratios than their high surface brightness counterparts, indicating that LSB galaxies may be dark matter dominated. This interpretation is hampered by the difficulty of disentangling the disc and dark halo contributions from the disc dynamics of LSB galaxies. Recently, Fuchs has attempted such a disentanglement using spiral arm density wave and swing amplification theory, allowing an independent measurement of the disc mass; this work suggests that LSB discs are significantly more massive than previously believed. This would considerably reduce the amount of matter required in the dark haloes in fitting the rotation curves. Interestingly, the high mass-to-light ratios derived for the discs appear inconsistent with standard stellar population synthesis models.

In this paper, we investigate whether the high M/L ratios for the Fuchs LSB discs might be understood by adopting a very `bottom heavy' initial mass function (IMF). We find that an IMF with a power-law exponent of around α= 3.85 (compared with the standard Salpeter IMF, α= 2.35) is sufficient to explain the unusually high M/L ratios of the Fuchs sample. Within the context of the models, the blue colours [(B-R)0 < 1.0] of the sample galaxies result from being metal-poor ([Fe/H]=-1.5 ~-1.0) and having undergone recent (~1-3 Gyr ago) star formation.

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