A simple analytic model for the evolution of captured galactic disks

Details A simple analytic model for the evolution of captured galactic disks A simple analytic model for the evolution of captured galactic disks

Jul 1990

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1990apj...357...62s&link_type=abstract

Astrophysical Journal, Part 1 (ISSN 0004-637X), vol. 357, July 1, 1990, p. 62-70.

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

17

Disk Galaxies, Galactic Evolution, Galactic Structure, Gravitational Fields, Interacting Galaxies, Galactic Rotation, Mass Distribution, Time Dependence

Scientific paper

The general analytic solution developed by Steinman-Cameron and Durisen and published in 1988 for the evolution of dissipative nonplanar disks is applied to captured galactic disks in model galaxies with nonspherical, scale-free, logarithmic gravitational potentials. Such potentials produce flat rotation curves, similar to those seen in real galaxies. In this case, the analytic solution yields a self-similar structure for the warps and twists that develop while the disks is settling. Being scale-free in a simple, analytic form, this solution is completely defined by only a few dimensionless fitting parameters. As a result, it can be utilized as a mathematical tool to fit settling disks in real galaxies. The minimum time it takes for a disk to settle into a steady state orientation is also a scale-free quantity when expressed in units of the precession period or the orbit period. For realistic parameters, settling times are on the order of one-half to two periods. The use of the time-dependent structure of settling disks as a probe of the three-dimensional mass distribution of the host galaxies, including dark halos, is discussed.

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