Accretion of gas onto nearby spiral galaxies.pdfVIP

a r X i v : 0 8 0 2 .0 4 9 6 v 1 [ a s t r o - p h ] 4 F e b 2 0 0 8 Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 000, 1–11 (xxxx) Printed 6 February 2008 (MN LATEX style file v2.2) Accretion of gas onto nearby spiral galaxies F. Fraternali1? and J. J. Binney2 1Department of Astronomy, University of Bologna, via Ranzani 1, 40127, Bologna, Italy 2Rudolf Peierls Centre for Theoretical Physics, 1 Keble Road, Oxford, OX1 3NP, UK Accepted xxx. Received xxx ABSTRACT We present evidence for cosmological gas accretion onto spiral galaxies in the local universe. The accretion is seen through its effects on the dynamics of the extra-planar neutral gas. The accretion rates that we estimate for two nearby spiral galaxies are of the order of their star formation rates. Our model shows that most of the extra-planar gas is produced by supernova feedback (galactic fountain) and only 10 ? 20% comes from accretion. The accreting material must have low specific angular momentum about the disc’s spin axis, although the magnitude of the specific angular-momentum vector can be higher. We also explore the effects of a hot corona on the dynamics of the extra-planar gas and find that it is unlikely to be responsible for the observed kinematical pattern and the source of accreted gas. However, the interaction with the fountain flow should profoundly affect the hydrodynamics of the corona. Key words: galaxies: kinematics and dynamics galaxies: individual: NGC 891, NGC 2403 galaxies: haloes galaxies: evolution ISM: kinematics and dynamics 1 INTRODUCTION Observations of several spiral galaxies have revealed thick H I layers or H I haloes surrounding the galac- tic discs (e.g. Swaters, Sancisi van der Hulst 1997; Fraternali et al. 2002; Matthews Wood 2003). The kine- matics of this extra-planar gas is characterized by: (i) a decrease in rotation velocity vφ in the ver- tical direction (Swaters, Sancisi van der Hulst 1997; Fraternali et al. 2005); (ii) vertical motions from and towards the disc (Boomsma