Ultradiffuse Galaxies—A Distinct Population? Dwarf Galaxies in the Coma Cluster and A262 from Deep u′–g′–r′ Wendelstein Imaging Data

Abstract

In this study, we compare the structural parameters of ultradiffuse galaxies (UDGs) to those of other dwarf galaxies and investigate whether UDGs form a distinct population. We observed deep $u^{\prime} $ -, $g^{\prime} $ -, and $r^{\prime} $ -band images (maximum limiting surface brightness [3 σ , 10″ × 10″] $u^{\prime} $ and $g^{\prime} $ : $\approx \ 30\,\mathrm{mag}\,{\mathrm{arcsec}}^{-2}$ ; $r^{\prime} $ : $\approx \,29\,\mathrm{mag}\,{\mathrm{arcsec}}^{-2}$ ) of A1656 (Coma cluster) and A262 with the Wendelstein Wide Field Imager at the 2.1 m Fraunhofer Wendelstein Telescope at the Wendelstein Observatory. We measure $u^{\prime} -g^{\prime} $ and $g^{\prime} -r^{\prime} $ colors and structural parameters using parametric fitting of tens of thousands of potential UDGs and other dwarf galaxies. Cluster members are identified and separated from diffuse background galaxies based on red sequence membership and location in the $u^{\prime} -g^{\prime} $ versus $g^{\prime} -r^{\prime} $ color–color diagram. We find 11 UDGs in A262 and 48 UDGs in A1656. The latter is 6 times more than van Dokkum et al. found in the overlapping region. By comparing the structural parameters of UDGs to non-UDGs in our sample and to spheroidals from the literature, we do not find any separation in all tested parameter spaces. Instead, UDGs form the diffuse end of the already well-known spheroidal population and slightly extend it. Furthermore, we find that the UDG definition used by Koda et al. and Yagi et al. mainly extends the definition by van Dokkum et al. toward ordinary spheroidals.

Keywords

• Galaxy photometry
• Low surface brightness galaxies
• Dwarf galaxies
• Dwarf spheroidal galaxies
• Galaxies
• Galaxy structure