The Globular Cluster Systems Around NGC 3311 and NGC 3309

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Scientific paper

We present extensive new photometry in (g',i') of the large globular cluster (GC) system around NGC 3311, the central cD galaxy in the Hydra cluster. We find that NGC 3311 has an exceptionally large population of 16,000 GCs, similar to the prototypical high specific frequency Virgo giant M87. The color-magnitude distribution shows that the metal-poor blue GC sequence and the metal-richer red sequence are both present, with nearly equal numbers of clusters. Bimodal fits to the color distributions confirm that the blue sequence shows the same trend of progressively increasing metallicity with GC mass that has previously been found in many other large galaxies. By contrast, the red sequence shows no change of mean metallicity with mass, but it shows an upward extension to much higher than normal luminosity into the UCD-like range, strengthening the potential connections between massive GCs and UCDs. Within the Hydra field, another giant elliptical, NGC 3309, is sitting just 100" from the cD NGC 3311. We use our data to solve simultaneously for the spatial structure and total GC populations of both galaxies at once. Their specific frequencies are SN(N3311) = 12.5+/-1.5 and SN(N3309) = 0.6+/-0.4. NGC 3311 is completely dominant and entirely comparable with other cD-type systems such as M87 in Virgo.

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