Côté (1995) surveyed the nearby Centaurus
A (Cen A) and Sculptor (Sci) group regions in the
search for gas-rich, dwarf irregular galaxies
(Irr) which are associated with these galaxy
aggregates. 36 Irrs have been found and confirmed
as new group members via
21cm/Hα redshifts. In finding
this large number of Irrs, the question rises
whether systems from the other dwarf galaxy
family, the gas-poor dwarf ellipticals (dE), also
exist in the two groups. So far nothing is known
about dE membership but taking into account the
morphology-density relation for dwarfs (Binggeli
et al. 1990) a number ratio Irr/dE≈ 1 - 2 would be
expected. Prompted by these “missing” dEs we
started a large program to identify and study dEs
in Cen A and Sci. The main scientific goals are
(1) to find dE candidates and to establish group
membership via velocity or distance and (2) to
estimate the luminosity function (LF) of dwarf
galaxies to the faintest possible luminosities.
For the two groups, being respectively at a mean
distance of 4.0 Mpc and 2.5 Mpc, we will be able
to reach dwarf galaxies 4-5 magnitudes fainter
than in the previous studies in the Virgo and
Fornax clusters and the five groups Leo I, Dorado,
NGC1400, NGC5044, and Antlia (Sandage et al. 1985,
Ferguson &: Sandage 1990). We briefly outline
here first results from the CenA group. All
details about the complete survey including Scl
will be presented in Jerjen et al. (1997)
Dwarf elliptical galaxies as ancient tidal dwarf galaxies
