The orientation of radio sources relative to the minor axes of their elliptical galaxies

The elliptical galaxies identified with 139 radio sources having double, wide-tail, twin-tail, or head-tail structures were examined on glass or film copies of Schmidt sky survey plates, and orientations were measured for 78 of them. The observed radio axes of well-collimated double sources are dist...

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Veröffentlicht in:Astrophysics and space science 1980-06, Vol.70 (1), p.211-232
1. Verfasser: Guthrie, B. N. G.
Format: Artikel
Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:The elliptical galaxies identified with 139 radio sources having double, wide-tail, twin-tail, or head-tail structures were examined on glass or film copies of Schmidt sky survey plates, and orientations were measured for 78 of them. The observed radio axes of well-collimated double sources are distributed over all possible orientations relative to their parent galaxies, but there is a significant preference for orientations within 30 deg of the projected minor axes of the galaxies. A similar minor-axis trend is found among wide-tail and twin-tail sources. The observed minor-axis peak is fairly broad. These results are consistent with either a very large dispersion in the ejection of radio components about the minor axes of oblate galaxies or a small dispersion about the equatorial planes of prolate galaxies. Other evidence indicates that both oblate and prolate radio galaxies exist.
ISSN:0004-640X
1572-946X
DOI:10.1007/BF00641674