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# A K-band central disk surface-brightness correlation with scale-length for early-type disk galaxies, and the inclination correction

## 1 Introduction

Over the last three decades, the validity of Freeman’s law – the observation that the $`B`$-band central disk surface brightness of spiral galaxies is roughly constant (Freeman 1970) – has been investigated many times. The interest generated by this work is not surprising given its implications for the formation and nature of disk galaxies. For instance, if the central $`M/L_B`$ ratio is constant in spiral galaxies, it would imply a constant central mass surface density which would provide a strong constraint to any potential disk galaxy formation mechanism. Subsequent studies observed the scatter in Freeman’s law to increase, notably from the inclusion of fainter late-type ($`>`$Sc) spiral galaxies (van der Kruit 1987), vindicating the argument by Disney (1976, 1980) that Freeman’s law was an artifact of selection effects. This result was expanded upon by de Jong (1996b), who argued that Freeman’s law must be redefined as de Jong found only an upper-limit to the central disk surface brightness term. Similarly, studies of low surface brightness galaxies reveal a class of spiral galaxies with central disk surface brightnesses lower than the canonical Freeman value (Longmore et al. 1982; Bothun et al. 1987; Davies et al. 1988; van der Hulst et al. 1993; McGaugh & Bothun 1994; de Blok, van der Hulst & Bothun 1995; de Blok, van der Hulst & McGaugh 1996; McGaugh 1996; Bothun, Impey & McGaugh 1997) and with no indication of a lower-limit.

An important consideration when measuring the central surface brightness of a disk is the question of the disk’s opacity. Extinction due to dust is an order of magnitude less in the $`K`$-band than the $`B`$-band. The $`K`$-band also has the advantage of tracing the old stellar population, and not the few percent (by mass) of young stars which dominate the light in the $`B`$-band. However, at least in the $`H`$-band, dust can still have a measurable effect on the disk surface brightness distribution (Aoki et al. 1991; Barnaby & Thronson 1992; Moriondo, Giovanelli & Haynes 1998). Amongst other things, this paper attempts to answer the question: What inclination correction, if any, needs to be applied to the observed $`K`$-band surface brightnesses (and magnitudes) of disk galaxies? Applying the right inclination correction is important as it influences statistical studies of the properties of spiral galaxies. It affects derivations of the luminosity function (Leroy & Portilla 1998), and hence galaxy magnitude and redshift number counts, and it also affects corrections to the Tully-Fisher relation for studies of peculiar velocity flows and large-scale structure.

One of the difficulties in using a galaxies central surface brightness is that it is a combination of both disk and bulge light. For a galaxy sample that includes Sa through to Sd or Sm galaxies, the contribution of the central bulge light to the central disk light can span a large range of values. Even for the Sc galaxies the bulge can contribute almost no extra light at the galaxy centre or it can be several magnitudes brighter than the disk. Kormendy (1977), Phillipps & Disney (1983), and later Davies (1990) argued that failure to accurately model the contribution of bulge light may place constraints on the true range of central disk surface brightness values which are measured. Although the physical applicability of the parameter space explored in these authors models has been questioned (de Jong 1996b), at some level, the issue of bulge contamination remains.

Many of the pioneering papers which fitted both a bulge and disk generally modelled the bulge with a de Vaucouleurs (1948) $`r^{1/4}`$ profile (Kormendy 1977; Burstein 1979; Boroson 1981, 1983; Kent 1985; Schombert & Bothun 1987). The risks of this assumption were mentioned by these authors and departures noted. de Jong (1996a) actually rejected the $`r^{1/4}`$ bulge profile in favour of an exponential bulge profile, which, in general, gave a statistically better fit to his sample of 86 disk galaxies. Today, however, the range of bulge profile shapes has been investigated (Andredakis, Peletier & Balcells 1995, hereafter APB95; Moriondo, Giovanardi & Hunt 1998), and application of the classical exponential profile or $`r^{1/4}`$ law to a bulge which is better described by some other light profile shape is known to introduce errors into the structural parameters of the galaxies (Graham & Prieto 1999, Graham 2001). While the effect is most dramatic on the bulge parameters, differences to the estimated central disk surface brightness can vary by 0.5 mag arcsec-2 or more, depending on the assumed bulge profile shape. To illustrate this, Figure 1 shows the $`K`$-band central disk surface brightness estimates from de Jong (1996a), obtained when modelling the bulge with first an $`r^{1/4}`$ profile and then an exponential profile. One can see that considerable differences arise when forcing a restrictive bulge model that has no physical basis. In an effort to separate the bulge light from the disk profile as accurately as possible, in this analysis a seeing-convolved $`r^{1/n}`$ bulge profile has been simultaneously fitted with a seeing convolved exponential disk profile.

With a sample of low- and high-inclination galaxies, the selection of which is presented in Section 2, this paper identifies a considerable source of scatter to the $`K`$-band central disk surface brightness – namely, the dependence on the disk scale-length (preliminary results have already been presented in Graham 2000a,b). Section 3 provides a description of the standard inclination correction while Section 4 attempts to provide a quantitative measure to the size of the $`K`$-band surface brightness inclination correction needed for spiral galaxy disks. In Section 5 the consequences of an opacity dependence on radius, such that disks are more optically thick towards the centre, is explored and found not to be important in the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram. Section 6 provides a discussion of the results and Section 7 presents the main conclusions from this investigation.

## 2 Data

The data used in this investigation are from two statistically complete, diameter-limited samples of galaxies selected from the Uppsala General Catalogue of Galaxies (UGC, Nilson 1973). A selection of galaxies with inclinations less than 50o were investigated by de Jong & van der Kruit (1994) while a somewhat complimentary sample of galaxies with inclinations greater than 50o were investigated by Balcells & Peletier (1994) and later APB95. Both studies avoided disturbed or interacting systems. $`K`$-band images taken with UKIRT’s IRCAM2, resulted in a volume-limited sample of 86 low-inclination spiral galaxies; for which the data reduction is described in de Jong & van der Kruit (1994).111The surface brightness profiles for the low-inclination sample, obtained from the average surface brightness on ellipses of constant ellipticity and position angle, can be found at http://cdsweb.u-strasbg.fr/htbin/Cat?J/A+AS/118/557. Images taken with UKIRT’s IRCAM3 resulted in a sample of 30 early-type ($`T`$$`<`$5) high-inclination spiral galaxies, for which the data reduction procedures can be found in APB95 and Peletier & Balcells (1997).222The surface brightness profiles for the high-inclination sample can be found at http://www.elsevier.nl/gej-ng/10/33/29/22/23/23/article.html. (The K-band light-profiles were taken from the ellipse fits, not the wedge profiles.) Due to the complimentary inclination selection-criteria, no common galaxies have been observed – preventing a check of the photometric zero-point. This is unfortunate, however, although calibration offsets of 0.05 mag are not uncommon between different data sets, this would not significantly impact the results of this investigation and is certainly tolerable.

There is a difference between the diameter-limited selection criteria of each sample. The low-inclination galaxies were selected to have a red major-axis diameter $``$2.0 arcmin, while the high-inclination galaxies were selected to have a blue major-axis diameter $`>`$2.0 arcmin. The difference to the final high-inclination sample, had the selection criteria for the larger low-inclination sample been used, is small. Only one galaxy (UGC 9016) with a blue major-axis diameter greater than 2.0 arcmin and having a red major-axis diameter less than 2.0 arcmin was included in the final sample of 30 galaxies by APB95 – this galaxy is easily excluded from this analysis. Two galaxies (UGC8485 and UGC 10713) with a red major-axis diameter $``$2.0 arcmin but with a blue-major-axis $``$2.0 arcmin would have been included if the diameter selection criteria was the same.

APB95 applied further selection criteria which de Jong & van der Kruit (1994) did not, but which can be applied here to make the samples as similar as possible. While de Jong & van der Kruit (1994) selected disk galaxy types from S0 to Irr, APB95 restricted their sample to galaxy types earlier than Sc. APB95 also applied a magnitude selection criteria, such that only galaxies with $`B_T`$$`<`$14.0 mag were included, and they excluded galaxies with bars. These same criteria are subsequently applied individually and all at once to the low-inclination sample to see if this affects the results of this investigation. The only major concern is that APB95 excluded 3 galaxies solely because they were observed to be very dusty, in the optical, all the way to the centre. This may well have an affect on the mean surface brightness of the high inclination sample. However, this still left a sample of 30 high-inclination galaxies and so it’s impact is not expected to be terribly substantial but should, nonetheless, be noted.

Using the same algorithm, all galaxies have been simultaneously modelled with a seeing convolved Sérsic (1968) bulge profile and a seeing convolved exponential disk. The model parameters obtained are the bulge effective half-light radius ($`r_e`$), the bulge surface brightness at this radius ($`\mu _e`$), the shape of the bulge profile ($`n`$), the central disk surface brightness ($`\mu _0`$), and the disk scale-length ($`h`$). The disk scale-length is that appropriate to the major-axis, and is not the geometric mean between the major- and minor-axis – a quantity shortened through inclination. A presentation of the fits to the low-inclination galaxies can be found in Graham (2000). Three of these galaxies have optical but no $`K`$-band data, and 5 were imaged under non-photometric conditions. Of the 86 low-inclination disks, 65 have morphological type $`T`$$``$5 (42 have $`T`$$``$4) – taken from the RC3 (de Vaucouleurs et al. 1991). Only two galaxies having $`T`$$``$5 could not be reliably modelled. These are UGC 8279 which has no apparent bulge – causing the bulge/disk decomposition to fail – and UGC 6028 whose disk has two distinct slopes. This left a sample of 59 low-inclination disk galaxies with morphological type $`T`$$``$5 (39 with $`T`$$``$4). For the sample of 59 galaxies, a $`V/V_{\mathrm{max}}`$ test gave an average value of 0.53 – in agreement with the expected value of 0.5$`\pm `$$`1/\sqrt{12\times N}`$ for a statistically complete, diameter-limited sample ($`=`$0.5$`\pm `$0.04 when $`N`$$`=`$59). Similarly, the smaller sample of 39 galaxies represents a statistically complete, volume-limited sample of $`T`$$``$4 disk galaxies, with the average $`V/V_{\mathrm{max}}`$$`=`$0.49. Although the remaining later type spiral galaxies are included in Figure 3 – to help highlight that the selection criteria are not clearly responsible for the observed trends – these galaxies have not been used in the statistical analysis which follows. All high-inclination galaxies, excluding UGC 9016, have been included. For these, the $`V/V_{\mathrm{max}}`$ test gave an average value of 0.51 – within the range 0.5$`\pm `$0.05 expected for a sample of 29 galaxies that is randomly distributed in space.

The central surface brightnesses have been uniformly corrected for a) Galactic extinction using the composite IRAS and COBE/DIRBE dust extinction maps of Schlegel, Finkbeiner & Davis (1998) – data obtained from NED b) $`(1+z)^4`$ cosmological redshift dimming and c) K-correction using heliocentric velocities (Poggianti 1997). For the low-inclination galaxies, the average size of these corrections was relatively small at -0.02, -0.05, and 0.02 mag respectively, with maximum corrections of -0.06, -0.12, and 0.04 mag. For the high-inclination sample, these corrections were again small, with average values of -0.02, -0.03, and 0.01, and they do not significantly alter the results of this paper.

In this paper a value of $`H_0`$$`=`$75 km s-1 Mpc-1 has been used. For both the low- and high-inclination galaxy samples, their distances were derived using the heliocentric velocities from NED which were then corrected for Virgo-infall using the 220 model of Kraan-Korteweg (1986).

## 3 The standard inclination correction

In the case of a transparent disk, stellar light is radiated equally in all directions. Consequently, the viewing angle (inclination) will not effect the observed magnitude of the galaxy. However, transparent disks that are seen at higher inclinations (with inclination $`i`$ increasing from face-on to edge-on) project to a smaller area on the sky and consequently their surface brightness (intensity/area) will appear brighter than if they had been viewed face-on. In contrast to this, for an optically thick disk the observed surface brightness will be independent of viewing angle, as the line-of-sight depth into the disk will be the same for all inclinations and the observed intensity per unit area will remain fixed. For optically thick disks viewed at higher inclinations, the total galaxy magnitude decreases as the projected area of the galaxy is decreased from its face-on value.

This situation has been expressed quantitatively with a simple model such that

$$\mu _{\mathrm{inc}}=\mu _{\mathrm{face}\mathrm{on}}+2.5C\mathrm{log}(b/a)$$
(1)
where $`b/a`$ is the ratio of the semi-minor to semi-major axis of the disk. For an optically thick disk $`C`$$`=`$0, and for an optically thin disk $`C`$$`=`$1. Of course, spiral disks may well be described by some intermediate degree of opacity, where $`C`$ would take on a value somewhere between 0 and 1. The value of $`C`$ is also known to be a function of wavelength since its origin is dust.

One can envisage a number of special locations for dust within a disk that would complicate the opacity test. In the text that follows, I shall refer to a disk that behaves transparently in an inclination test as a ‘transparent disk’. The disk may in fact not be transparent, or may be only semi-transparent. In one case of interest, dust may reside in the disk with a scale-height less than that of the stars. If so, as noted by Disney et al. (1989), the outer parts of the disk (in the $`z`$-direction) may be transparent while sandwiched between these two outer layers is obscuring dust. As the inclination increases, the outer layers, as opposed to the disk as a whole, will cause the observed surface brightness to brighten above its face-on value (Davies et al. 1993; Davies, Jones & Trewhella 1995). Another case of interest is if a dust ring was to encircle the disk. Although unlikely, this may occur to a degree by dust in the outer spiral arms (Huizinga 1994). For face-on galaxies, and galaxies at intermediate inclinations, this would simply introduce a wiggle into the outer light profile, but for those galaxies which are very edge-on this would create a biased impression of the global opacity of the disk.

Irrespective of the location or distribution of the dust, all future reference to the value of $`C`$ is made only in regard to the required, statistically averaged, inclination correction, and not to the nature of the disk as a whole.

## 4 Application of the correction

### 4.1 A constant central disk surface brightness – Freeman’s law

The inclination correction was uniquely determined for each galaxy depending on the ellipticity of its disk. With $`C`$$`=`$0, the inclination correction to the surface brightness term is zero. With $`C`$$`=`$1, the average size of the inclination correction for the low-inclination sample of spiral galaxies is 0.26 mag arcsec-2, and the maximum correction 0.58 mag arcsec-2. For the high-inclination sample of galaxies, when $`C`$$`=`$1, the average correction is 1.34 mag arcsec-2 and the maximum correction is 1.92 mag arcsec-2 for a galaxy with a disk ellipticity ($`ϵ`$$`=`$1-$`b/a`$) equal to 0.83. In passing, it is noted that if some of the galaxy disks do not posses circular symmetry but are intrinsically elongated, then this will introduce a source of scatter into the inclination corrections. One may therefore be able to further reduce the scatter in the central disk surface brightness distribution by using kinematic, rather than photometric, inclinations (Andersen et al. 2000). Although, these differences are greatest at small inclinations where the size of the inclination corrections are small.

The scatter in the distribution of central disk surface brightnesses is known to be larger in the $`K`$-band than the B-band, and $`\mu _0`$ is known to increase for galaxy types $`T`$$`>`$5-6 (Grosbøl 1985; Valentijn 1990; Peletier et al. 1994; de Jong 1996b; Tully & Verheijen 1997; de Grijs 1998) and this is also seen with the current sample. In Figure 2, when $`C`$$`=`$1, $`\mu _{0,K}`$ displays no trend with morphological type $`T`$$``$5. Given the similarity of central disk surface brightness between the $`T`$$`=`$5 galaxies and the earlier types, they have been included in the statistical analysis which follows so as to increase galaxy numbers and improve the statistics. In later comparison studies between the low- and high-inclination samples, the affect of removing the $`T`$$`=`$5 galaxies, which are not present amongst the high-inclination sample, is explored.

For the low-inclination galaxies with type $`T`$$``$5, the mean value of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ is 17.45$`\pm `$0.76 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and 17.72$`\pm `$0.74 ($`C`$$`=`$1) For the high-inclination sample, the mean value of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ is 16.10$`\pm `$0.70 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and 17.45$`\pm `$0.65 ($`C`$$`=`$1). For the combined sample of galaxies with $`T`$$``$5, the mean central disk surface brightness is 17.01$`\pm `$0.98 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and 17.63$`\pm `$0.72 ($`C`$$`=`$1). The inclusion of galaxy types with $`T`$$`>`$5 increases both the mean value of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ and the associated error.

### 4.2 A central disk surface brightness correlation with scale-length

A plot of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ against $`\mathrm{log}h`$, where $`h`$ is the scale-length of the disk, reveals – for the early-type disk galaxies – a correlation between these two parameters (Figure 3). One can also see, when no inclination correction is applied ($`C`$$`=`$0), that for a given size (scale-length) of a disk, the high-inclination sample are observed to have brighter values of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ than the low-inclination sample – indicating the transparent behaviour of at least the early-type disks. The decision to include the $`T`$$`=`$5 galaxies in the low-inclination sample does not appear to affect the observed $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation, where-as the later galaxy types do show a departure from the relation defined by the earlier-type galaxies. A discussion of the influence of the selection criteria on this apparent correlation is deferred to Section 6.

After application of the $`C`$$`=`$1 inclination correction, a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.75 exists between $`\mu _{0,K}`$ and $`\mathrm{log}h`$ (kpc) for the combined sample of low- and high-inclination early-type ($`T`$$``$5) disk galaxies. The previous standard deviations in the distribution of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ are 42% and 53% higher than the standard deviations about the mean $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation – which are 0.69 mag arcsec-2 (when $`C`$$`=`$0) and 0.47 mag arcsec-2 (when $`C`$$`=`$1).

From Figure 3, it is clear that when no correction is made for inclination ($`C`$=0) the low- and high-inclination data sets have different mean central surface brightnesses. Subtracting the mean $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation, one can remove the dependence of surface brightness on galaxy size before computing the difference in mean values of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ for the two samples. A Student’s $`t`$-test on the two residual data sets (low-inclination and high-inclination) reveals significantly different means. Using the F-test for the similarity of variances, these residual data sets have different variances at the 1.5$`\sigma `$ significance level. Student’s $`t`$-test was therefore applied twice: assuming equal and then unequal variances. The probability that the value of $`t`$ from Student’s test could be as large as it is just by chance is smaller than $`10^7`$ – indicating that the difference in means is highly significant. In addition to subtracting the mean $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for the combined sample, the mean $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for the low-inclination sample, and also for the high-inclination sample, were separately subtracted and Student’s $`t`$-test applied again. From all six $`t`$-test’s (equal and unequal variances, and using the three different mean $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relations) the probability that the difference in means could be as large as it is remained less than $`10^7`$.

With $`C`$$`=`$1, the same tests were again applied. This time, the variances of the two residual data sets were not only found to be equal at the 1$`\sigma `$ level, but were notably reduced for the high-inclination sample. The mean values of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ from the residual data sets – having subtracted the mean $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation – were found to be consistent with each other at well within the 1$`\sigma `$ confidence limit. That is, application of Student’s $`t`$-test reveals that with $`C`$$`=`$1, the mean surface brightness offset between the low- and high-inclination galaxies in the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ plane is not significant.

To compute the mean offset, a modified application of the Working-Hotelling (1929) confidence bands was used (Feigelson & Babu 1992). This method of analysis performs a linear regression on one data set (the calibration set) and then, given the $`x`$-values ($`\mathrm{log}h`$) of the second data set, predicts their $`y`$-values (in our case $`\mu _{0,K}`$) and their associated uncertainty. The difference between these predicted values and the observed values is a measure of the offset. The standard deviation of this distribution of differences divided by $`\sqrt{N}`$ gives the uncertainty on the mean of the offset. With $`C`$$`=`$0 or $`C`$$`=`$1 the low- and high-inclination data sets are consistent (at the 1$`\sigma `$ level) with being parallel to each other – a requirement of the Working-Hotelling technique. When $`C`$$`=`$0 the mean vertical offset is -0.97$`\pm `$0.11 mag arcsec-2, and when $`C`$$`=`$1 the mean offset is +0.10$`\pm `$0.10 mag arcsec-2.333The Working-Hotelling confidence bands allow one to obtain two estimates of the offset by using in turn both data sets as the ‘calibration’ data set. The mean offset was not significantly different when this was done.

The vertical scatter about the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for the high-inclination sample is reduced by 20% when the $`C`$$`=`$1 inclination correction is applied. Further support for the validity of the inclination correction comes from the improved agreement in slope of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation between the low- and high-inclination data sets. For the low-inclination spirals, an ordinary least-squares regression of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ on $`\mathrm{log}h`$ reveals a slope of 2.05$`\pm `$0.23 ($`C`$=0) and 1.98$`\pm `$0.22 ($`C`$=1). For the high-inclination spirals, the slope is 1.76$`\pm `$0.59 ($`C`$=0) and 2.12$`\pm `$0.41 ($`C`$=1). The error estimates for the slopes are slightly larger ($``$5-10%) than those obtained from the standard analytical solution which, for small sample sizes ($`N`$$`50`$), can under-estimate the size of the error. The errors shown here are the largest standard deviations obtained from jackknife and bootstrap resampling of the data. For the combined data sets, with $`C`$$`=`$1, the mean slope is 1.96$`\pm `$0.18 with a scatter about the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation of 0.47 mag arcsec-2.

With $`C`$$`=`$0.91, the mean offset between the two samples was 0.00, but this did not result in a significantly different slope or scatter to the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation obtained when $`C`$$`=`$1. For the low-inclination sample, with $`C`$$`=`$0.91, the slope was 1.99$`\pm `$0.21 with a scatter of 0.47 mag arcsec-2. For the high-inclination sample the slope was 2.08$`\pm `$0.48 with a scatter of 0.49 mag arcsec-2, and for the combined sample the slope was 2.01$`\pm `$0.18 with scatter 0.47 mag arcsec-2 and a Pearson’s correlation coefficient of 0.76. Completely independent of the two inclination bins ($`i`$$`<`$50o or $`i`$$`>`$50o), the scatter about the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation reduced to a minimum as the value of $`C`$ increased to 0.9-1.0.

If one wishes to use the $`K`$-band $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for distance estimates, then one should perform a linear regression which minimizes the distance dependent quantity $`\mathrm{log}h`$ (kpc) against the distance independent quantity $`\mu _{0,K}`$.444Strictly speaking, the surface brightness term is dependent on the redshift via the K-correction and redshift dimming, but these corrections, or more importantly, realistic errors in these corrections due to errors in redshift are less than 0.01 mag arcsec-2. Doing this, with $`C`$$`=`$1, the resulting standard deviation is a somewhat large 0.18 dex in $`\mathrm{log}h`$ which corresponds to a mean distance uncertainty of $``$50%.

#### 4.2.1 Sub-sampling the data

The above analysis was repeated several times, culling each data set to make them more similar to each other – and testing if these steps caused any significant changes (at the 1$`\sigma `$ level). Firstly, the Sc galaxies included in the low-inclination sample were removed. This had no significant effect on any of the above numbers. Next, because the low-inclination sample has only two S0 galaxies (both with type $`T`$$`=`$0) while the high-inclination sample includes S0 galaxy types from $`T`$$`=`$-3 to 0, all S0 galaxies and Sc galaxies were removed from both samples, leaving only types $`T`$=1 to 4. Again, the numbers obtained were not significantly different with those obtained using the full sample. With $`C`$$`=`$1 the slope of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation changed to 2.03$`\pm `$0.24 with a slightly greater Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.77.

The high-inclination galaxy sample of APB95 excluded galaxies with a prominent bar – of the 29 galaxies used from this sample, NED still lists 8 of these with having a bar. Therefore, the above tests were repeated excluding those galaxies from the 59 low-inclination galaxies which de Jong (1996a) considered to have a prominent bar – which he modelled with an additional bar component. None of the results differed at more than the 1$`\sigma `$ significance level and usually well under this. Excluding the prominently barred galaxies, the mean vertical offset between the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for the low- and high-inclination samples is -1.00$`\pm `$0.11 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and +0.07$`\pm `$0.10 ($`C`$$`=`$1). The mean slope of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for the combined data sets changed to 1.83$`\pm `$0.21 ($`C`$$`=`$1) with a scatter of 0.49 mag arcsec-2. Next, the 8 galaxies from the high-inclination sample listed as having bars were removed as was every galaxy in the low-inclination sample which was listed in NED as having a bar. Once again, the above results did not significantly differ, and it can be concluded that these results are not biased by the presence of a bar in some of the sample members.

APB95 further restricted their sample to galaxies listed in the UGC with $`B_T`$$`<`$14.0 mag. This same restriction was applied here to the low-inclination sample to test if this may be influencing the results – it does not. Lastly, the above criteria were all applied at once to see if they may be working together to bias the above results. All S0 and Sc galaxies were excluded, as were all galaxies listed in the UGC with $`B_T`$$`<`$14.0 mag and all galaxies considered to have a prominent bar. Ignoring the dependence of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ on $`\mathrm{log}h`$, the mean value of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ for the low-inclination sample was 17.43$`\pm `$0.71 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and 17.67$`\pm `$0.66 ($`C`$$`=`$1). For the high-inclination sample these values were 16.05$`\pm `$0.82 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and 17.42$`\pm `$0.75 ($`C`$$`=`$1). This heavy sample truncation had the greatest effect on the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation, whose slope became 1.80$`\pm `$0.34 ($`C`$$`=`$1) – still, however, consistent with the solution obtained with the larger galaxy sample. The scatter about the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation changed to 0.87 mag arcsec-2 ($`C`$$`=`$0) and 0.51 mag arcsec-2 ($`C`$$`=`$1).

To continue in this vain, and address constructive criticism, next, those galaxies at the tails of the scale-length distribution were excluded. Removing the one galaxy with a disk scale-length less than 1 kpc from the high-inclination sample changed the slope of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation for the high-inclination sample to 2.00$`\pm `$0.59 ($`C`$$`=`$1). Removing the 1 galaxy from the low-inclination sample with a disk scale-length less than 1 kpc had practically no affect at all. At the other end of the distribution, five galaxies from the low-inclination sample have scale-lengths larger than 10 kpc ($`H_0`$$`=`$75 km s-1 Mpc-1). Although, when using the same Hubble constant as de Jong ($`H_0`$$`=`$100 km s-1 Mpc-1), only 2 galaxies have a disk scale-length greater than 9 kpc and only 1 galaxy has a disk scale-length greater than 10 kpc. Still, these five galaxies were excluded to test if they may be biasing the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ correlation. Doing this, the slope of the combined data set was reduced to 1.67$`\pm `$0.21 ($`C`$$`=`$1). Excluding these five galaxies, and those two galaxies with disk scale-lengths less than 1 kpc, the slope of the combined data set became 1.55$`\pm `$0.23 ($`C`$$`=`$1), with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.60. This is still a highly significant result. The Spearman rank-order correlation coefficient is 0.58 – with a significance of 2.10-8. Similarly, the sum-squared difference of ranks deviates from the expectation value in the null hypothesis of uncorrelated data sets by more than 5 standard deviations.

As a final check, the high-inclination sample had previously been independently modelled by Khosroshahi et al. (2000) using a two-dimensional image decomposition technique that fitted a seeing convolved Sérsic bulge and exponential disk. Applying the inclination correction to the data in their Table 1, and the various other surface brightness and Virgo-infall corrections mentioned earlier, the above analysis was repeated again and found to be fully consistent with the results presented above.

## 5 Possible scale-length changes with inclination

For a galaxy with a globally uniform disk opacity, the surface brightness profile will brighten with inclination (or remain the same if it is optically thick) by the same amount at all radii. The scale-length of the disk would therefore be independent of inclination. If, however, the opacity of the disk changes with radius, then the scale-length could change as the galaxy was viewed at different inclination angles. This scenario opens the door to the possibility that the inclined galaxies in Figure 3 may not have simply moved along lines of constant scale-length. In the extreme, one may postulate that disks are optically thick at their centres and $`\mu _{0,K}`$ does not change with inclination but instead the scale-length changes to produce the shift in Figure 3. However, rather than acting as a hindrance to the question of disk opacity, this effect is rather fortuitous as it actually enables us to additionally constrain possible changes in opacity with radius.

If disks are more dusty in their central parts than their outer parts, then the disk scale-lengths will increase with inclination. Indeed, there is evidence that disks may in fact be more optically thick at their centres (Huizinga & van Albada 1992; Bosma et al. 1992; Jansen et al. 1994; Giovanelli et al. 1994; Peletier et al. 1995; Beckman et al. 1996; Trewhella et al. 1997). As such galaxies are viewed with increasing inclination, the outer parts of the disks will brighten more than the inner parts; this would act to reduce the slope of the disk surface brightness profile and therefore increase the disk scale-length from its face-on value – although this effect will be less in the near-infrared than the optical.

On average, in the $`K`$-band, the decline in opacity with radius must be fairly uniform from the disk centre to outer boundary. If this were not the case, the surface brightness profiles of the inclined disks should be seen to systematically deviate from an exponential light distribution (having Sérsic shape parameters $`n`$$`>`$1) and possess kinks and gradient changes due to uneven surface brightness increases. Of course some profiles do possess such features, and some display a brightening of the outer disk profile above that defined by the exponential behaviour of the inner disk profile. This could be a signature of a disk which is transparent only in the outer parts and brightening with inclination. However, such galaxies in the sample which behave this way have no preference for higher inclinations, and the reason for such gradient changes therefore seems likely to be due to other causes, perhaps resulting from an under-estimation of the sky-background level. The over-whelming majority of $`K`$-band disk profiles in the sample are well described by an exponential law.

How realistic can changes to the scale-length be for a uniform decrease in opacity with radius? Obviously the greatest change will occur if the centre of the disk is opaque and the outer, measured parts of the disk are fully transparent. For a galaxy observed at some random inclination, with a central disk opacity $`C`$ and the outer disk fully transparent (i.e. $`C`$$`=`$1), one can compute the change in scale-length, due to inclination, from the face-on value. For a disk with a measured scale-length $`h_{\mathrm{obs}}`$ derived from its light profile data which extends to $`x`$ scale-lengths, the face-on scale-length is given by the expression

$$h_{\mathrm{face}\mathrm{on}}=h_{\mathrm{obs}}\frac{x}{x+\mathrm{\Delta }\mu /1.086},$$
(2)
where $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mu `$$`=`$(1-$`C`$)$`\times `$2.5$`\mathrm{log}(a/b)`$. For the high-inclination sample of disk galaxies, the average maximum reduction to the disk scale-length which can be achieved assuming radial differences in the transparency of the disk (with $`C`$$`=`$1 at the outer radius, and $`C`$$`=`$0 at the inner radius) is only 23$`\pm `$6%. This is not enough to bring the low- and high-inclination galaxies into agreement in Figure 3; in fact, it is short by about a factor of ten. The disk scale-lengths of the low-inclination galaxies undergo an average reduction of 6$`\pm `$4% when corrected, under the previous assumption, to their face-on value.

Any surface brightness and scale-length inclination correction to the face-on value will of course affect the high-inclination sample the most. It is therefore of interest to see how the scatter about the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation changes in this sample when both of these inclination corrections are applied. Changing the central value of $`C`$ and correcting $`\mu _{0,K}`$ and $`\mathrm{log}h`$ using equations 1 and 2 (i.e. assuming the outer disk is fully transparent), an ordinary least squares bisector line of regression was fitted to the data. A bisector line of regression treats both variables equally, as opposed to the ordinary least squares regression of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ on $`\mathrm{log}h`$ which was used in the previous Section where the scatter was considered only to arise from the surface brightness term (see Feigelson & Babu 1994 for a discussion). The perpendicular scatter, and also the vertical scatter in $`\mu _{0,K}`$, were observed to steadily decrease to a minimum as the central disk value for $`C`$ approached 1. This was also the case when an orthogonal regression line was used. When fitting a bisector regression line to the combined low- and high-inclination galaxy sample, the minimum perpendicular scatter, and also vertical scatter in $`\mu _{0,K}`$, was achieved when $`C`$$`=`$0.9 – a result independent of the two inclination bins.

To explore this further, a bisector line of regression was individually fitted to each of the two data samples and the Working-Hotelling method adapted to compute the central value of $`C`$ which gives the smallest perpendicular offset between the two samples in the $`\mu _{0,K}`$-$`\mathrm{log}h`$ plane. Correcting $`\mu _{0,K}`$ and changing the scale-length assuming the maximum possible opacity gradient, when using the 59 low-inclination galaxies as the calibration set in the Working-Hotelling method, the minimum offset occurred when $`C`$$`=`$0.89. Using the 29 high-inclination galaxies as the calibration set, this occurred when $`C`$$`=`$0.97.

To check for differences arising between the ordinary least squares regression of $`\mu _{0,K}`$ on $`\mathrm{log}h`$ and the bisector method or regression, the bisector method of regression was again applied to the data while the scale-lengths were held constant, and only corrections to the surface brightness applied – as was done previously. The minimum perpendicular offset between the low- and high-inclination galaxies was found to occur when $`C`$$`=`$0.91 and 0.98 when the low-inclination and high-inclination galaxies were respectively used as the calibration data set.

## 6 Discussion

One of the problems, and hence some of the uncertainty today, with some of the past surface brightness inclination tests was that they used the ‘mean’ surface brightness ($`<`$$`\mu `$$`>`$) within some fixed isophotal radius. Consequently, one did not know if changes to the mean surface brightness, with inclination, were due to changes to the enclosed integrated magnitude or due to changes to the isophotal radius (Chołoniewski 1991; Burstein, Haynes & Faber 1991; Huizinga & van Albada 1992). With central surface brightnesses ($`\mu _0`$) this is not a problem. Furthermore, the selection criteria biases from either a magnitude-limited or diameter-limited sample, which have previously been illustrated to operate in the apparent magnitude – apparent diameter ($`B_T`$$`\mathrm{log}D`$) diagram (Burstein et al. 1991), do not apply to the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}D`$ or $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram. For example, although the use of apparent magnitudes from a diameter-limited sample of galaxies would bias one to conclude that disks are optically thick (Burstein et al. 1991), this is not the case when using central surface brightnesses – as observed in this investigation.

Increasing the inclination of optically thin disks from face-on, their isophotal radii increase while their magnitudes remain constant; if they are optically thick, their magnitudes decrease while their isophotal radii remain constant. Independent of the opacity of the disk, this situation results in ‘inclined’ galaxies changing positions in the $`B_T`$$`\mathrm{log}D`$ plane from their face-on values and leaving one uncertain as to whether the apparent magnitude, the isophotal diameter or a combination of both has changed. Chołoniewski (1991) and Burstein et al. (1991) tried to resolve this dilemma by using distance information, but Davies et al. (1995) showed the presence of the redshift-cutoff selection criteria left this mean surface brightness inclination test unable to tell one anything about the transparency of disks. This dilemma, however, does not exist in the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}D`$ diagram. If disks are optically thick, then neither $`\mu _0`$ or $`\mathrm{log}D`$ will change with inclination. If disks are optically thin then they will move towards brighter $`\mu _0`$ and larger $`\mathrm{log}D`$ values as they are viewed at greater inclination angles. Therefore, any positional correlation with inclination in the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}D`$ diagram will indicate that disks are at least semi-transparent; a lack of any such trend will indicate they are opaque. The strength of any such trend depending on the inclination of the sample (which is known) and the apparent opacity of the disk (which one could then measure). The situation is even simpler here because scale-lengths, rather than isophotal diameters, have been used, and for a globally constant disk opacity the former will not change with inclination - although possible radial changes in the opacity of the disk have been explored here.

For transparent galaxies, as the inclination angle increases the isophotal diameters will increase. Consequently, the high-inclination galaxy sample may contain galaxies which are intrinsically smaller than the galaxies in the low-inclination sample. Although, as noted by Huizinga (1994), this may not be such a problem for galaxies selected from the UGC. Their diameters were estimated by eye to the faintest structures visible on the photographic plates. Given that these structures are probably HII regions whose surface brightness does not change with inclination, the diameter inclination dependence is probably small. Anyway, plotting central surface brightness against disk scale-length should account for any selection bias due to galaxy size in this inclination test.

This investigation is free from criticisms levelled at previous studies which used central disk surface brightnesses without accurately considering the contribution of the bulge light to the disk profile. Kormendy (1977) and Davies (1990) have shown how the linear part of the surface brightness profile can be contaminated by bulge light, and how fitting to this part of the profile alone can result in erroneous estimates of the central disk surface brightness. In the analysis presented here, Sérsic $`r^{1/n}`$ models convolved with a Gaussian PSF have been fitted to the bulge while an exponential model, also convolved with the PSF, was simultaneously fitted to the disk. For the low-inclination sample, the FWHM of the PSF had been individually obtained for each galaxy from stars on the image frames (de Jong 1996a). For the high-inclination sample, a value of 1.0 arcsec was used – the actual seeing varied from 0.8$`\mathrm{}`$ to 1.2$`\mathrm{}`$ but this had little affect on the results of the disk parameters (see also Khosroshahi et al. 2000).

There have been a few near-infrared investigations, employing different techniques, to measure the value of $`C`$ required for the inclination correction. Using 1.65$`\mu `$m ($`H`$-band) aperture photometry, Peletier & Willner (1992) and Boselli & Gavazzi (1994) presented evidence that disks behaved in a semi-transparent way: with $`C_H`$$``$0.65 and $`C_H`$$`=`$0.5-0.9 respectively. A more recent study using a two-dimensional bulge/disk decomposition found $`C_H`$$`=`$0.60$`\pm `$0.14 (Moriondo, Giovanelli & Haynes 1998). With a $`K^{}`$ study, Tully & Verheijen (1997) found that the minimum scatter in the central disk surface brightness for their high surface brightness (HSB) galaxies occurred when $`C_K^{}`$$`=`$1, in agreement with this papers $`K`$-band analysis. Given that near-infrared (2.2-$`\mu `$m) light passes largely undisturbed through dust clouds, the line-of-sight depth into (and through?) a spiral galaxy disk is expected to increase as one views spiral galaxies, and hence disks, at greater inclinations. It is therefore reassuring to find that the observed central disk surface brightness does increase with galaxy inclination in the $`K`$-band.

The decision to use spiral galaxies with morphological types $`T`$$``$5 was determined by two factors. Firstly, the high-inclination galaxy sample were all of this type. It should perhaps be mentioned that difficulties in matching morphological type at different inclinations may introduce some small bias, but given the inherent uncertainty in this business (Lahav et al. 1995) this is not expected to be important for this sample. The other reason for using the early-type galaxies is that the late-type spirals do not follow the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation evident for the early-type disk galaxies. For a given scale-length, galaxy types later than Sc can be considerably fainter than the earlier type spirals. To show this, Figure 3 displays the data for the low-inclination disk galaxies having type $`T`$$`>`$5. This data has not been included in any of the calculations presented previously.

Further evidence to segregate the late-type and early-type disk galaxies comes from work by Tully & Verheijen (1997) who show that the S0-Sc and Scd-Sm-Irr galaxies have markedly different central surface brightness values, not just as a function of Hubble type but also in the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ plane (but see Bell & de Blok 2000). Considering Figure 3 from this paper with Figure 2 from van den Bosch (1998) – which shows a $`V`$-band $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relationship for all types of galaxy disks – one can see that the late-type spirals from the sample of de Jong & van der Kruit reside in the same part of the diagram as the low surface brightness galaxies. Previous inclination tests which have looked for a correlation between $`\mu _0`$ and $`\mathrm{log}(b/a)`$ may therefore suffer confusion/noise because of inclusion of late-type galaxies ($`T`$$`>`$5) and because of the relationship between surface brightness and scale-length amongst the early-type spirals.

Could selection effects be responsible for this trend between $`\mu _{0,K}`$ and $`\mathrm{log}h`$ by preventing early-type galaxies from occupying the upper-right or lower-left of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram? The selection criteria are such that they favour the detection of galaxies with large scale-lengths and luminous central surface brightnesses. At a fixed scale-length, the probability of detecting galaxies that have central surface brightnesses which are brighter than those observed along the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation is actually greater than the probability of detecting those galaxies at the same scale-length which define the observed relation. Therefore, the upper envelope in the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram reflects a true drop-off in the number density of bigger, brighter spiral galaxies, and has been noted before.

Grosbøl (1985) suggested that it might be due to an upper constant luminosity limit, in which case the slope should be 5. However, his photographic data appears more consistent with a slope of $``$3. Figure 4 shows that for the early-type spiral galaxies, the $`B/D`$ luminosity ratio is, if anything, smaller for the smaller scale-length galaxies. Therefore, the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation clearly does not delineate a constant upper luminosity boundary to the luminosity function – even when the presence of the bulge light is factored in. Fitting a line of constant luminosity in the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram with a slope of 2.5 instead of 5, Kent (1985) mistakingly attributed the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ correlation to a limited range of disk luminosities in his sample, Using the $`I`$-band Sb-Sd galaxy data from Byun’s (1992) thesis, the slope of this envelope is $``$1.9 (see also Reshetnikov 2000), and a somewhat smaller value of 1.5 is obtained from the composite data of Dalcanton, Spergel & Summers (1997, their figure 4). Evstigneeva & Reshetnikov (1999) have claimed, from a compilation of 356 galaxies, that normal high surface brightness spiral disks follow a trend such that $`\mu _02.5\mathrm{log}h`$ with a correlation coefficient of 0.45 and a scatter of $``$1 mag arcsec-2. After submission, the author discovered that Möllenhoff & Heidt (2001) report a slope of 2.02$`\pm `$0.64 ($`r=0.61`$) in the near-infrared for a sample of 40 bright, low-inclination, early-type ($`leq`$Sc) spiral galaxies without bars, in complete agreement with the results obtained here (see also Seigar & James 1998; Moriondo, Giovanardi, & Hunt 1998 and Khosroshahi et al. 2000).

Recent studies of bulge dominated low surface brightness (LSB) galaxies (Beijersbergen, de Blok & van der Hulst 1999) have shown that they appear to continue the trend defined by the normal early-type high surface brightness (HSB) galaxies which have been used here. With considerably more scatter still, a similar trend exists not just for the ordinary high surface brightness spiral galaxy disks, but also for the low surface brightness disks, disky ellipticals and HST resolved nuclear disks (Scorza & van den Bosch 1998; Reshetnikov 2000). For a constant velocity, the virial theorem, which can be expressed as $`v^2Ih`$, predicts a slope of 2.5 in the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram. How, and whether or not, this could be the limiting criteria is not clear.

In passing, it is noted that the presence of the high-inclination galaxies located 1 mag above the upper envelope to the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation defined by the low-inclination sample is strong evidence for the need of the inclination correction.

The occupation of the late-type spirals in the lower-left of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram, in the region of lower rotational velocity, is in accord with observational results (Zaritsky, 1993, his figure 2). The selection criteria do however somewhat restrict the galaxy sample from occupying this part of the diagram. The dotted lines in the upper panel of Figure 3 reveal the nature of the selection criteria and show the completeness of the sample to the indicated distances (15, 40, 100 Mpc; $`H_0`$$`=`$75 km s-1 Mpc-1). Assuming perfectly exponential disks, these lines show the 2.0$`\mathrm{}`$ diameter limit at the 22.45 $`K`$-mag arcsec-2 isophote. (The average surface brightness where the UGC red diameters were measured is 24.7 $`R`$-mag arcsec-2, and the mean $`R`$-$`K`$ colour at the 60$`\mathrm{}`$ radius for those galaxies in the low-inclination sample with photometric data and morphological type 1$``$$`T`$$``$5 is 2.25$`\pm `$0.07.) Galaxies near the 100 Mpc line had (100/15)3$``$300 times more chance of being included in the sample than those near the 15 Mpc line. For any ($`\mu _{0,K}`$,$`\mathrm{log}h`$) parameter combination between two close pairs of these curved lines, there is an equal probability of observing a galaxy if it exists in, at least, the local Universe. Therefore, within any such curved region, the absence of early-type disk galaxies below the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation indicates that they do not exist here in as great a number density as the population on the observed $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation and within the same curved bands. The presence of the late-type galaxy population in the lower part of the $`\mu _{0,K}`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram suggests that these galaxies exist with a greater number density than the early-type spirals in this domain of the parameter space.555The late-type galaxies are some 0.30$`\pm `$0.16 mag bluer in $`R`$-$`K`$ than the early-type galaxies and so the selection criteria lines shown in Figure 3 for the early-type spirals will be different by this amount for the late-type spirals. The inclusion of disk-dominated low surface brightness galaxies is known, at least at shorter wavelengths, to fill in the lower left of the diagram (Bothun et al. 1997, their figure 4; Dalcanton et al. 1997; McGaugh 1998). Whether or not, in the $`K`$-band, early-type spiral galaxies reside in the lower left of the $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ diagram in any great number density cannot be answered with the present data set. Consequently, while the observed $`\mu _0`$$`\mathrm{log}h`$ relation may reflect the location to the bulk of the early-type galaxy population, it may also only reflect the upper envelope – which is, in itself, still of interest. It would be of benefit to extend the current data sample to smaller disks and fainter surface brightness levels.

## 7 Main conclusions

The well known modification to Freeman’s law to incorporate fainter central disk surface brightnesses is, in some respect, partially quantified. A relation is presented for the disks of early-type spiral galaxies. Their central disk surface brightnesses, at least in the $`K`$-band, are shown to increase (that is, become fainter) with increasing disk scale-length, such that $`\mu _{0,K}2\mathrm{log}h`$. This relation is not adhered to by the late-type ($`geq`$Scd) spiral galaxies.

It is found that the disks of early-type spiral galaxies ($`leq`$Sc) should be considered transparent for the sake of inclination corrections to their observed photometric parameters. From a number of tests, the optimal value of $`C`$ in the standard inclination correction formula $`2.5C\mathrm{log}(b/a)`$, where $`b/a`$ is the minor-to-major axis ratio, resides between 0.9 and 1.0. This implies that the maximum correction, in the confines of the inclination correction formula, should be applied to the observed $`K`$-band disk surface brightness, and simultaneously, no corrective term for dust should be applied to the observed K-band magnitudes.

## 8 acknowledgements

I am grateful to John Beckman and Marc Balcells for their reading and comments on this paper. I also wish to thank Peter Erwin for enjoyable discussions, Eric Feigelson for making the computer code SLOPES and CALIB publicly available and Renée Kraan-Korteweg for sending me her Virgo-centric inflow code. I thank Gregory Bothun and R. de Jong for their input and suggestions, which helped to improve this paper. This research has made use of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.


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# Sloan Digital Sky Survey Multicolor Observations of GRB010222

## 1 Introduction

Gamma Ray Bursts (GRBs) were first detected over three decades ago by the Vela satellites (Klebesadel et al., 1973), and the first search for optical counterparts started nearly immediately with W. A. Wheaton’s use of the Prairie Network (Grindlay & Wright, 1974). These searches were fruitless until very recently; positions accurate to a few arcminutes were not available for days, after the bursts had decayed substantially, placing afterglows beyond the reach of the few large telescopes searching for them. BATSE’s near-real-time coordinates had several degree positional errors (Paciesas et al., 1999) allowing only specialized wide field instruments to respond to its triggers (Krimm et al., 1995; Lee et al., 1997; Akerlof et al., 1999). The BeppoSAX satellite (Scarsi, 1993) was the first to provide arcminute accuracy within a few hours of a GRB. With the early announcements of those accurate positions, beginning in 1997, large telescopes could join the search and discovered GRB afterglows starting with GRB970228 (Groot et al., 1997; van Paradijs et al., 1997).

The following work describes observations of GRB010222 with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey’s (SDSS; York et al. 2000) telescopes. The SDSS is a project to image 10,000 $`deg^2`$ of the Northern Galactic Cap in five different filters ($`u^{},g^{},r^{},i^{},z^{}`$) to a depth of $`r^{}23`$ and to perform followup spectroscopy of the $`10^6`$ brightest galaxies and $`10^5`$ quasars found in the photometry. The SDSS is designed to be on the $`u^{}g^{}r^{}i^{}z^{}`$ photometric system described in Fukugita et al. (1996) which is an $`AB_\nu `$ system where flat spectrum objects ($`F_\nu \nu ^0`$) have zero colors (Fukugita et al., 1996). The magnitudes in this paper are quoted on the preliminary $`u^{},g^{},r^{},i^{},z^{}`$ system which may differ by at most a few percent from the system of Fukugita et al. (1996). The dedicated survey instruments, a 2.5m survey telescope and a 0.5m photometric telescope (PT), are located at Apache Point Observatory (APO) in Sunspot, New Mexico.

## 2 Observations

GRB010222 was detected by BeppoSAX on 2001 February 22 at 07:23:30 U.T. in both the Gamma Ray Burst Monitor (GRBM; 40-700 keV) and the Wide Field Camera Unit 1 (WFC1; 2-28 keV) instruments, and was “possibly the brightest (GRB) ever observed by BeppoSAX” (Piro, 2001). The coordinates of the BeppoSAX detection were distributed via the GRB Coordinates Network (GCN; Barthelmy et al. 1998) at 10:36 UT (Piro, 2001), and Henden (2001a) reported the discovery of an optical counterpart at 11:48 UT, 4.4 hours after the trigger. (See finding chart, Figure 1.) At this time conditions at APO were not ideal for SDSS survey imaging as clouds were approaching, and the time remaining in the night did not allow for a switch to spectroscopy; thus SDSS observers decided to follow up the counterpart with both the 0.5m PT and the 2.5m survey telescope. Fortunately for these observations the cloud passed before GRB imaging began and conditions were more photometric after the cloud than before.

### 2.1 0.5m Photometric Telescope Observations

The photometric telescope is an f/8.8, 0.5m telescope equipped with $`u^{}g^{}r^{}i^{}z^{}`$ filters. The single SITe $`2048\times 2048`$ CCD camera has a $`41.5^{}\times 41.5^{}`$ field of view. The PT took a series of five, 300 second observations in $`g^{}`$ band centered on the reported GRB010222 location, following the afterglow for approximately 30 minutes before ending operations for the night (see Table 1). Normally, the photometric telescope and the associated reduction software are used on objects with $`g^{}18.0`$. Since the GRB exposures were unusually long and the counterpart was relatively dim (the Poisson error limit is $`3\%`$) photometry was performed within a smaller than standard aperture to improve the relative photometry of faint objects. The counterpart magnitudes were then corrected using a sigma clipped mean of the magnitude offsets in each frame from the mean magnitude across the five frames of well measured stars ($`g^{}17.0`$); corrections were at most 0.005 mag, indicating conditions were photometric over the 30 minute timespan.

### 2.2 2.5m Survey Telescope Observations

The 2.5m survey telescope is an f/5, 3$`\mathrm{°}`$ field of view telescope designed and constructed for the SDSS. The telescope has two interchangeable instruments, an imaging camera and a fiber-fed spectrograph. The imaging camera (Gunn et al., 1998) includes an array of 30 $`2048\times 2048`$ CCDs in six columns of five CCDs each, one CCD for each of the 5 filters. The camera operates in a drift scan mode, scanning the sky in great circles at sidereal rate. Astronomical objects are imaged for 53.9 seconds in each CCD in the order $`r^{}i^{}u^{}z^{}g^{}`$. Because of the gaps between columns the telescope must observe a second such interleaved strip to make a complete stripe.

For GRB010222 the 2.5m telescope observed two short interleaved strips covering a roughly $`2.5\mathrm{°}`$ square region. The GRB010222 counterpart was found in the second strip, field 22 of camera column 3, run 2143. The images were processed through the normal SDSS data processing pipelines and calibrated against two 0.5m PT secondary fields (hereafter, patches) of the GRB field observed March 14 and 17. These patches in turn were calibrated against a system of standard stars (Smith et al., in preparation) which the 0.5m PT observes several times throughout the night to measure extinction and determine photometric zeropoints. Our diagnostic tests of the location of the stellar locus and number counts of various classes of objects, as compared with the approximately 1000 $`deg^2`$ of sky observed already in the survey, indicate the relative calibrations are no worse than 2% in any filter. The zeropoints also agree to within 1% with a second indirect calibration based on other 2.5m data from the same night and four secondary patches from two previous nights. Thus we are confident the relative (absolute) errors are no greater than the standard SDSS values of 3%(5%) for $`u^{}`$, $`g^{}`$, and $`z^{}`$, and 2%(3%) for $`r^{}`$ and $`i^{}`$ (where the absolute errors include possible differences between the SDSS preliminary photometric system and the system of Fukugita et al. 1996). The calibrated 2.5m magnitudes are shown in Table 1 along with 0.5m PT observations. Table 2 includes $`u^{}g^{}r^{}i^{}z^{}`$ magnitudes for eleven reference stars in field 22, including the reference star “A” listed in McDowell et al. (2001). All stars have been selected from unsaturated and non-interpolated (for cosmic ray correction) stars with $`r^{}19.0`$ with the exception of the reference star “A” from McDowell et al. (2001). This star was interpolated in $`r^{}`$ band, but the correction was within the quoted errors and visual inspection revealed no problems.

## 3 Results

The fading of GRB optical afterglows is often well fit by a power-law decay of $`F_\nu t^\alpha `$ with $`\alpha 1`$ although decay rates from slightly less than this to $`\alpha =2.1`$ (Groot et al., 1998) and breaks to steeper power-laws have been observed in some afterglows. GRB010222 appears to be best fit by broken power-law models (Holland et al., 2001; Masetti et al., 2001) with early decay rates of $`\alpha 0.6`$ to $`0.7`$ and steeper later time decays of $`\alpha 1.3`$ with the break occurring around 0.5 days after the GRB. Considering the short time span and the limiting errors, measurements of the decay rate with the 0.5m PT observations were difficult. The error weighted least squares fit to the five $`g^{}`$ points gives $`\alpha =1.0\pm 0.5`$ (see Figure 2), which is consistent with other early decay rates measured for this burst (Price et al., 2001; Fynbo et al., 2001; Stanek et al., 2001b; Holland et al., 2001; Masetti et al., 2001).

The spectral shape of GRB afterglows is also well fit by a power-law, $`F_\nu \nu ^\beta `$ with typical values of $`\beta 1`$. In order to derive a power-law fit for our 2.5m $`u^{}g^{}r^{}i^{}z^{}`$ observations we first corrected for the local Galactic extinction with the dust map of Schlegel, Finkbeiner, & Davis (1998) which gives extinction values of $`A_u^{}`$ = 0.118, $`A_g^{}`$ = 0.087, $`A_r^{}`$ = 0.063, $`A_i^{}`$ = 0.048, and $`A_z^{}`$ = 0.034 at the reported location $`\alpha =14^\mathrm{h}52^\mathrm{m}12\stackrel{\mathrm{s}}{\mathrm{.}}55`$, $`\delta =+43\mathrm{°}01\mathrm{}06\stackrel{}{\mathrm{.}}2`$ (J2000; Henden & Vrba 2001b). We next wished to correct for the small effect of fading over the few minutes between exposures in the individual bands at 4.8 hours after the burst. Because of the large errors in our own decay rate measurement we instead used a least squares fit to a single power-law for all reported $`R`$ band data points within 8 hours after the burst (and before the $`0.5`$ day break; see McDowell et al. 2001; Stanek et al. 2001a; Watanabe et al. 2001; Holland et al. 2001) with magnitudes adjusted to the calibration of Henden (2001c) where necessary. The resulting fit to the published $`R`$ band data is $`\alpha =0.71\pm 0.10`$, consistent with values reported by Holland et al. (2001). We applied decay corrections relative to $`r^{}`$ of \[-0.0035, -0.0066, -0.010, -0.013\] to $`i^{},u^{},z^{},g^{}`$.

Once these corrections were applied, the least squares fit to all five filters is $`\beta =1.10\pm 0.10`$. However, a much better fit can be obtained by excluding the $`u^{}`$ filter; the remaining non-UV filters have a least squares fit of $`\beta =0.90\pm 0.03`$ (see Figure 3). This second value agrees closely with the spectral slope of $`\beta =0.89\pm 0.03`$ observed by Jha et al. (2001b) in a spectrum observed 4.92 hours after the burst, shortly after the 2.5m observations. Our $`u^{}`$ magnitude, at an effective wavelength of 3565Å, is approximately 20% lower than the power-law fit to the other bands. A similar deficit was seen in the $`U`$ band observations of Masetti et al. (2001) one and two days after the burst, and Jha et al. (2001b) may see the beginning of this steepening in their last binned spectra point near 4000Å. (After this work was submitted similar $`U`$ band results were reported by Stanek et al. (2001c) for observations from 0.2 to 2 days after the burst.) These independent observations indicate this spectral feature remained constant for at least two days.

We propose that the break in the spectrum at $`u^{}`$ may be an indication of one of two possibilities: either the Ly$`\alpha `$ forest or extinction at the source. The first possible explanation for the $`u^{}`$ deficit is that the counterpart is at a redshift near 2 rather than at the redshift 1.477 absorption system reported by Garnavich et al. (2001); Jha et al. (2001a); Bloom et al. (2001); Castro et al. (2001); Jha et al. (2001b) and Masetti et al. (2001). For an object without detected emission lines such as GRB010222, an absorption line system can only provide a lower z limit to the source redshift. The spectrum of Jha et al. (2001b) does not extend far past 4000Å, thus no upper limit is imposed until $`z=2.3`$. For observed QSOs the Ly$`\alpha `$ forest enters $`u^{}`$ at redshifts slightly above $`z=1.477`$, but the 20% depression observed here would not occur unless the redshift were $`2.0`$ (Cristiani et al., 1993). However Jha et al. (2001b) convincingly argue that given the strength of the $`z=1.477`$ absorber the GRB source is almost certainly at that redshift. Thus a true GRB source redshift of $`2`$ would seem to be an unlikely explanation.

A second, more probable, explanation is that the counterpart may reside in a star-forming region at $`z=1.477`$ similar to the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) or Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and be extincted at the source. Dust in front of the GRB could cause the extinction of the afterglow and the gas would explain the large equivalent widths in the $`z=1.477`$ absorption system (York et al., 1986). To examine this possibility we have fit the full extinction curve model of Reichart (2001) to the SDSS data. Acceptable fits can be found for a wide range of intrinsic power-law spectra (with index $`\beta ^{}`$). We present two possibilities, $`\beta ^{}=0.75`$ and $`0.5`$. These choices for $`\beta ^{}`$ are motivated as follows: under the models of Sari, Piran, & Narayan (1998) and Sari, Piran, & Halpern (1999) the afterglow is described in terms of synchrotron emission from a decelerating relativistic shell or jet colliding with the surrounding ISM. The resulting spectrum can be expressed as four power-laws broken at three time-dependent frequencies, the synchrotron self-absorption frequency $`\nu _a`$, the cooling frequency $`\nu _c`$, and the frequency corresponding to the minimum Lorentz factor of accelerated electrons $`\nu _m`$. If the shock evolves adiabatically in a constant density medium, the break in the light curve at $`0.5`$ days (Holland et al., 2001; Masetti et al., 2001) might be explained by a jet if the observed $`\nu _{opt}>\nu _c`$ and $`\nu _m`$, and $`\beta ^{}0.75`$. If the shock instead evolves radiatively, the break in the light curve might be explained by $`\nu _m`$ passing through the optical at $`0.5`$ days if $`\nu _c<\nu _{opt}<\nu _m`$, and $`\beta ^{}0.5`$. For $`\beta ^{}=0.75(0.5)`$, we find that the best fits in the Reichart (2001) model are the source extinction $`A_V0.032`$ (0.13) mag, the slope of the UV linear component $`c_21.35`$ (1.34), the strength of the UV bump $`c_38.1`$ (2.7), and the strength of the FUV non-linear component $`c_430`$ (6.9). These curves are shown in Figure 4 which includes a typical SMC-like extinction curve for a source spectrum with $`\beta ^{}=0.75`$ and source extinction $`A_V`$ = 0.10. For the $`\beta ^{}=0.75`$ case there is a strong degeneracy between $`A_V`$ and the parameters $`c_3`$ and $`c_4`$ such that only $`A_Vc_3`$ and $`A_Vc_4`$ can be constrained; $`c_3`$ and $`c_4`$ can be increased to any value by decreasing $`A_V`$, thus statistically we can only set lower bounds. For $`\beta ^{}=0.75`$, $`A_V<0.057`$ mag ($`1\sigma `$) and $`A_V>0`$ at the $`4.8\sigma `$ confidence level; $`c_2=1.35_{0.21}^{+0.18}`$; $`c_3>0`$ at the $`1.1\sigma `$ confidence level; and $`c_4>11(1\sigma )`$, $`c_4>0`$ at the $`2.5\sigma `$ confidence level. Further, $`c_4>1`$ (higher than any observed value) at the $`2.1\sigma `$ confidence level. For $`\beta ^{}=0.5`$ the degeneracy is not as stong, and we can place the following limits: $`A_V=0.13_{0.09}^{+0.08}`$ mag and $`A_V>0`$ at the $`4.8\sigma `$ confidence level; $`c_2=1.34_{0.21}^{+0.18}`$; $`c_3>0`$ at the $`1.3\sigma `$ confidence level and $`c_3<5.6`$ ($`1\sigma `$); $`c_4>0`$ at the $`2.1\sigma `$ confidence level, $`c_4>1`$ at the $`1.6\sigma `$ confidence level, and $`c_4>3.4`$ ($`1\sigma `$). The Reichart (2001) fits to the two GRB models are approximately equally likely (with the $`\beta ^{}=0.75`$ model fit only 1.4 times more probable than the $`\beta ^{}=0.5`$ model fit).

The Reichart (2001) best fit values of $`c_2`$ and the second value of $`c_3`$ are typical of that observed in the LMC. Given the errors, the first value of $`c_3`$ is not inconsistent with this interpretation. However, for both afterglow models the values of $`c_4`$, required to extinguish $`u^{}`$ relative to the other bands, are about an order of magnitude greater than those found in the LMC or SMC. Waxman & Draine (2000) and Galama & Wijers (2001) propose that the optical flash (e.g., Akerlof et al. 1999) and the burst may sublimate and fragment dust in the circumburst environment. If small (radius $`<`$ 300 $`\mathrm{\AA }`$) graphite grains, which may be responsible for the FUV non-linear component (Draine & Lee, 1984), survive in greater numbers in this environment, this value of $`c_4`$ is not unreasonable. Alternatively, the large $`c_4`$ value and $`u^{}`$ band deficit could be due to absorption by molecular hydrogen (Draine, 2000) which would span the entire $`u^{}`$ band at $`z=1.477`$; however the expected feature at $`\lambda 1650`$Å redshifted to $`\lambda 4000`$Å is not obvious in the published spectra.

## 4 Conclusions

The serendipitous 2.5m survey telescope observations of GRB010222 occurred in this case because of the very fortunate timing of a counterpart discovery announcement towards the end of a night when conditions did not favor normal survey operations. The 2.5m camera is an unwieldy instrument for rapid followup observations; nonetheless this observation has shown the value of early five filter observations. In addition to the measurement of the $`g^{}r^{}i^{}z^{}`$ spectral slope ($`F_\nu \nu ^{0.90\pm 0.03}`$), the break to a steeper slope in $`u^{}`$ (also seen in the $`U`$ band observations of Masetti et al. 2001 and Stanek et al. 2001c) was not predicted or seen in spectra, and may indicate an alternate source redshift, source extinction in a star forming region modified by the GRB or its progenitor, or something else entirely.

The 0.5m PT is an automated telescope and in general much better suited for GRB followup observations than the 2.5m survey telescope. In this case the same timing that was so fortunate for the 2.5m was disadvantageous for the PT, which was only able to observe the burst near its limit and for a short period before shutting down for the night. Due to an afterglow’s rapid decay, typical BeppoSAX delays of several hours place afterglows near the detection limit of smaller telescopes. HETE-2, launched in October of 2000, will soon provide $`10`$ arcminute positions for GRBs within minutes of the trigger, potentially allowing telescopes such as the PT to measure both the spectral and temporal behavior of a burst in the first few hours.

## Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Scott Barthelmy and everyone who has made the GCN possible, as well as the BeppoSAX team who provided the localization so crucial to this work. We would also like to thank Bruce Woodgate for his help in these observations.

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) is a joint project of The University of Chicago, Fermilab, the Institute for Advanced Study, the Japan Participation Group, The Johns Hopkins University, the Max-Planck-Institute for Astronomy (MPIA), the Max-Planck-Institute for Astrophysics (MPA), New Mexico State University, Princeton University, the United States Naval Observatory, and the University of Washington. Apache Point Observatory, site of the SDSS telescopes, is operated by the Astrophysical Research Consortium (ARC).

Funding for the project has been provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the SDSS member institutions, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, Monbusho, and the Max Planck Society. The SDSS Web site is http://www.sdss.org/.