| Title | A new technique to gauge luminosity fluctuations in galaxies. |
| Authors | Lorenz, H.; Bohm, P.; Capaccioli, M.; Richter, G. M.; Longo, G. |
| Bibcode | 1993A&A...277L..15L Search ADS ↗ |
| Abstract | We report on an improved technique for measuring the surface brightness fluctuations in galaxies, on its feasibility, and on its limitations. Our method relies on the pioneering work by John Tonry and collaborators on fluctuations arising from the counting statistics of the stars which contribute to the flux at each pixel of a high signal-to- noise ratio CCD image of a galaxy. The amplitude of such fluctuations is first of all a measure of stellar population variables, but it varies also inversely to the distance of a galaxy and can thus be used to determine extragalactic distances in the nearby universe. We show that our technique, applied to early-type galaxies observed with NTT at ESO, La Silla, combines distance and stellar population variables with global and morphological properties of these systems. We find possible indication for fine structures in the distribution of the brightest stars in galaxies. |
| Objects | 3 Objects Search NED ↙ |
