Photometric Properties of Six Local Volume Dwarf Galaxies from Deep Near-Infrared Observations

TL;DR

This study presents deep near-infrared imaging of six local dwarf galaxies, revealing their photometric and structural properties, including new detections, and explores their stellar populations and potential dark matter content.

Contribution

First detailed near-infrared photometric and structural analysis of six local dwarf galaxies, including new detections and comparison with optical data.

Findings

Deep NIR imaging down to 24 mag arcsec^{-2} surface brightness.

2MASS underestimates magnitudes for brighter dwarfs by up to 0.5 mag.

Surface brightness profiles fitted with exponential or Sersic laws.

Abstract

We have obtained deep near-infrared $J$- (1.25 $\mu$m), $H$- (1.65$ \mu$m) and $K_s$-band (2.15 $\mu$m) imaging for a sample of six dwarf galaxies ($M_B\ga-17$ mag) in the Local Volume (LV, $D\la10$ Mpc). The sample consists mainly of early-type dwarf galaxies found in various environments in the LV. Two galaxies (LEDA 166099 and UGCA 200) in the sample are detected in the near-infrared for the first time. The deep near-infrared images allow for a detailed study of the photometric and structural properties of each galaxy. The surface brightness profiles of the galaxies are detected down to the ~$24 mag arcsec^{-2}$ isophote in the $J$- and $H$-bands, and $23 mag arcsec^{-2}$ in the $K_s$-band. The total magnitudes of the galaxies are derived in the three wavelength bands. For the brightest galaxies ($M_B\la-15.5$ mag) in the sample, we find that the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) underestimates the total magnitudes of these systems by up to $\la0.5$ mag. The radial surface brightness profiles of the galaxies are fitted with an exponential (for those galaxies having a stellar disk) or S\'ersic law to derive the structure of the underlying stellar component. In particular, the effective surface brightness ($\mu_e$) and effective radius ($r_e$) are determined from the analytic fits to the surface brightness profile. The $J$-$K_s$ colours for the galaxies have been measured to explore the luminosity-metallicity relation for early-type dwarfs. In addition, the $B$-$K_s$ colours of the galaxies are used to assess their evolutionary state relative to other galaxy morphologies. The total stellar masses of the dwarf galaxies are derived from the $H$-band photometric measurements. These will later be compared to the dynamical mass estimates for the galaxies to determine their dark matter content.