1306.4337 (S. Haan et al.)

The Build-Up of Nuclear Stellar Cusps in Extreme Starburst Galaxies and Major Mergers    [PDF]

S. Haan, L. Armus, J. A. Surace, V. Charmandaris, A. S. Evans, T. Diaz-Santos, J. L. Melbourne, J. M. Mazzarella, J. H. Howell, S. Stierwalt, D. C. Kim, T. Vavilkin, D. B. Sanders, A. Petric, E. J. Murphy, R. Braun, C. R. Bridge, H. Inami

Nuclear stellar cusps are defined as central excess light component in the stellar light profiles of galaxies and are suggested to be stellar relics of intense compact starbursts in the central ~100-500 pc region of gas-rich major mergers. Here we probe the build-up of nuclear cusps during the actual starburst phase for a complete sample of Luminous Infrared Galaxy systems (85 LIRGs, with 11.4View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1306.4337