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A Detailed View of the Fundamental Plane of Early-Type Galaxies in Clusters at z~0.2

Alexander Fritz, Bodo L. Ziegler

astro-pharXiv:astro-ph/0405078

Abstract

We present a spectroscopic sample of 48 early-type galaxies in the rich cluster Abell 2218 and 50 galaxies in Abell 2390. Since both samples are very similar, we combine them and investigate a total number of 98 early-type galaxies at z~0.2. A subsample of 34 galaxies with HST structural properties is used to construct the Fundamental Plane. Elliptical and S0 galaxies show a zeropoint offset of mr~0.43 mag with respect to the local Coma FP. Both sub-samples, ellipticals and lenticulars, exhibit a similar, mild evolution and small scatter. The moderate amount of luminosity evolution is consistent with stellar population models of passive evolution, if zf>=2 is assumed.

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