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Session 41 - Elliptical Galaxies.
Display session, Tuesday, January 14
Metropolitan Ballroom,
We describe the X-ray properties of the first X-ray-complete optically selected sample of elliptical galaxies. Our sample of 43 ellipticals is optically complete to a corrected B magnitude of 11.36. We analyze ROSAT and Einstein X-ray data for 42 of these 43 galaxies. Correcting for Malmquist bias, we find a steeper correlation between X-ray and optical luminosities than found in most previous studies; we compare this luminosity trend to theoretical models. We also review our spectral analysis, in which we determined temperatures and abundances for 30 of the sample galaxies. In every case, we find the gas is hotter than the kinetic temperatures of the stars, which is a strong indication that dark matter halos are dynamically hotter than the luminous stars. Alternative explanations are also discussed.
