DENSITY WAVE THEORY OF GALACTIC SPIRAL ARMS. THE SHEARING SHEET MODEL

Author(s):  
BURKHARD FUCHS
1979 ◽  
Vol 84 ◽  
pp. 155-156
Author(s):  
J. V. Feitzinger ◽  
Th. Schmidt-Kaler

Checking the density-wave theory against observations of our own Galaxy has proven very difficult, as witnessed also at this Symposium. Less ambiguous results, however, are obtained for other galaxies. These results involve a) calculating convincing models for a sample of 25 fairly well observed spirals (Roberts et al. 1975) and b) locating the compression zones on the inner edges of the spiral arms.


2015 ◽  
Vol 810 (1) ◽  
pp. 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yumi Choi ◽  
Julianne J. Dalcanton ◽  
Benjamin F. Williams ◽  
Daniel R. Weisz ◽  
Evan D. Skillman ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 490 (1) ◽  
pp. 1470-1473 ◽  
Author(s):  
J E Pringle ◽  
C L Dobbs

ABSTRACTIn spiral galaxies, the pitch angle, α, of the spiral arms is often proposed as a discriminator between theories for the formation of the spiral structure. In Lin–Shu density wave theory, α stays constant in time, being simply a property of the underlying galaxy. In other theories (e.g. tidal interaction, and self-gravity), it is expected that the arms wind up in time, so that to a first approximation $\cot \alpha \propto t$. For these theories, it would be expected that a sample of galaxies observed at random times should show a uniform distribution of $\cot \alpha$. We show that a recent set of measurements of spiral pitch angles (Yu & Ho) is broadly consistent with this expectation.


2020 ◽  
Vol 496 (2) ◽  
pp. 1610-1619
Author(s):  
Shameer Abdeen ◽  
Daniel Kennefick ◽  
Julia Kennefick ◽  
Ryan Miller ◽  
Douglas W Shields ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT The spiral arms spanning disc galaxies are believed to be created by density waves that propagate through galactic discs. We present a novel method of finding the co-rotation radius where the spiral arm pattern speed matches the velocities of the stars within the disc. Our method uses an image-overlay technique, which involves tracing the arms of spiral galaxies on images observed in different wavelengths. Density wave theory predicts that spiral arms observed from different wavelengths show a phase crossing at the co-rotation radius. For the purpose of this study, 20 nearby galaxies were analysed in four different wavelengths with pitch angle measurements performed by two independent methods. We used optical wavelength images (B band 440 nm), two infrared wavelength images provided by Spitzer (3.6 and 8 μm) and ultraviolet images from GALEX (1350, 1750 Å). The results were compared and verified with other records found in the literature. We then found rotation curve data for six of our galaxies and used our co-rotation radii estimates to measure the time that would elapse between star formation and moving to their observed positions in the B-band spirals. The average time lapse for this motion was found to be ∼50 Myr. The success of this new method of finding the co-rotation radius confirms density wave theory in a very direct way.


1988 ◽  
Vol 10 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 45-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
M Raj Lakshmi ◽  
H R Krishna-Murthy ◽  
T V Ramakrishnan

2013 ◽  
Vol 433 (3) ◽  
pp. 2511-2516 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evgeny Griv ◽  
Chow-Choong Ngeow ◽  
Ing-Guey Jiang

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