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W.M. Lane (NRL), D.E. Harris (CfA), T.A. Ensslin (MPA-Garching), N.E. Kassim (NRL), R.A. Perley (NRAO)
We present a wide-field map of the radio galaxy 3C 129 and its companion galaxy 3C 129.1 at \lambda = 90 cm. Both galaxies are part of an X-ray identified cluster at z=0.021, which has been excluded from most optical studies because it lies in the galactic plane. 3C 129 is a narrow-angle-tail (NAT) source with a plume-like double-tail extending nearly 30' at a wavelength of 90cm. We see a distinct steep-spectrum feature near its head, extending in a direction perpendicular to the radio tails. We propose is that this `crosspiece' might consist of fossil radio plasma, which has been re-energized by the compression of the bow shock wave of the supersonically moving galaxy 3C 129. One possible origin of the fossil radio plasma could be the tail of a nearby head-tail radio galaxy, and we discuss the implications of this scenario.
WML is a National Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow. Basic research in astronomy at the Naval Research Laboratory is funded by the Office of Naval Research. DEH acknowledges support from NASA grant GO1-2135A.
The author(s) of this abstract have provided an email address for comments about the abstract: lane@rsd.nrl.navy.mil