To Build an Eliptical Galaxy

I discuss two essential aspects of elliptical galaxy formation: how they get their stars, and how they lose their gas.  For the former, I use integral-field observations of local massive galaxies to study the stellar populations and kinematics of stars at large radius, to understand the origin of the size growth of elliptical galaxies. Then I focus on black hole feedback as a means of clearing gas from massive galaxies.  I show that luminous obscured quasars have ubiquitous, round ionized outflows with very high gas dispersions of nearly 1000 km/s out to 20 kpc. Finally, if time permits I will show some new results on the demographics of supermassive black holes based on megamaser disk galaxies.

Speaker: Jenny Greene, Princeton Univ.