Formation of collisional ring galaxies in Milgromian dynamics

Abstract

ABSTRACT Ring galaxies are rare in the Universe. A head-on or off-centre collision between an intruder galaxy and a disc galaxy leads to a collisional ring galaxy (CRG) when the intruder-to-target mass ratio (ITMR) is over 0.1 in Newtonian dynamics. Within the framework of Milgromian dynamics, the strong equivalence principle is violated due to the presence of an external field. When two galaxies collide towards each other, the dynamical mass of the phantom dark halo in a galaxy is suppressed by the external field induced by the other galaxy. As a consequence of such suppression, the gravitational perturbation for the target galaxy introduced by a collision is weakened. In this case, a minor collision may not be capable of generating a CRG. In this work, we address this issue and perform a series of numerical simulations of collisions by tuning the values of ITMR. We find that the critical ITMR is 0.5 in MOND, which is much larger than that in Newtonian dynamics. The observed massive ring galaxies, such as Arp 147, can be effectively interpreted by CRGs in Milgrom’s Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND). This interpretation does not necessitate the presence of dark matter halos for either the target or intruder galaxies. Moreover, for a larger inclination angle or a larger impact parameter, the off-centred ring structure is fainter. The larger critical ITMR indicates that it is harder to form a CRG in MOND. To account for the observed ring structures of the NGC 922-like galaxies in MOND, it is necessary to invoke other scenarios than a dry minor collision.