Dust-driven wind from disk galaxies

Abstract

We study gaseous outflows from disk galaxies driven by radiation pressure on dust grains. We include the effect of bulge and dark matter halo and show that the existence of such an outflow implies a maximum value of disk mass-to-light ratio. We show that the terminal wind speed is proportional to the disk rotation speed in the limit of a cold gaseous outflow, and that in general there is a contribution from the gas sound speed. Using the mean opacity of dust grains and the evolution of the luminosity of a simple stellar population, we then show that the ratio of the wind terminal speed (v ∞) to the galaxy rotation speed (vc ) ranges between 2 and 3 for a period of ∼10 Myr after a burst of star formation, after which it rapidly decays. This result is independent of any free parameter and depends only on the luminosity of the stellar population and the relation between disk and dark matter halo parameters. We briefly discuss the possible implications of our results. © 2011. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.