Multicolor surface photometry of 17 ellipticals

Abstract

Multicolor two-dimensional surface photometry was used to obtain radial profiles for surface brightness, color, ellipticity, position angle, and the residuals from the fitted ellipses described by the cos(n phi) and sin(n phi) terms (where n = 3 and 4) for 17 elliptical galaxies. It is found that at radii as large as five times the seeing FWHM, seeing can affect the ellipticity at the 10 percent level and introduce uncertainty in the position angles of several degrees, particularly for very round ellipticals. The present profiles are found to agree well with previous data, with rms differences of 0.02 in ellipticity and 2 deg in position angle. The observed color gradients are consistent with a decrease in the metallicity by a factor of about 2 per decade in radius.