A correlation between supermassive black hole mass and galaxy light concentration

Authors: Alister W. Graham, Peter Erwin, Nicola Caon, & Ignacio Trujillo

Poster presentation at the Guillermo Haro GH2001 conference on "Disks of Galaxies : Kinematics, Dynamics and Perturbations"

Abstract: The varying global distribution of stars, or specifically, their concentration Cre, within elliptical galaxies and spiral galaxy bulges is intimately related to the mass of their central supermassive black holes (Mbh), such that log (Mbh/Msun) = 6.81(+/-0.95)Cre + 5.03(+/-0.41). This correlation has a Spearman correlation coefficient rs=0.91, and a scatter of only 0.31 dex in log(Mbh) . Removing one well understood outlying data point and using only those galaxies whose supermassive black hole's radius of influence has been resolved (reducing the sample size from 21 to 13) results in a scatter of only 0.19 dex.