TUNA Lunch Talk:

Brian Kent

NRAO-CV

Neutral Gas Content of Detections Toward the Virgo Cluster

September 30

12:10PM, Room 230, NRAO, Edgemont Road

Abstract:

The Virgo Cluster is the nearest large, rich cluster to our own Milky Way galaxy, and is a primary target for many surveys across the spectrum. I will discuss results describing a new HI catalog toward the Virgo Cluster and some of the fascinating new detections. The catalog, compiled from a large area blind survey with the Arecibo multibeam receiver (ALFA), has a mass sensitivity limit of 2 x 107 Msun at a distance of 16.7 Mpc. The final survey, covering 7000 square degrees, will catalog detections in both void and cluster regions for environmental studies of the HI mass function. A number of detections in the periphery do not have obvious optical counterparts in available online optical imaging databases. Follow-up observations with the VLA have revealed their morphology. These "optically inert" gas clouds in the cluster are not detected in large numbers, lending to the notion that they are likely transient phenomena. Several other survey products, including a large wide-field mosaic of high galactic latitude HI, will be shown.