A Python-based tool for parametrizing the rotation curve and the galaxy potential of disk-like galaxies.
GalRotpy is intended to the understanding of the contributions of each mass component to the gravitational potential of disk-like galaxies and in the corresponding rotation curve. This software is presented as a pedagogical tool for supporting the following research areas: galactic dynamics, cosmology and gravitation.
GalRotpy requires essentially the galpy package and the three fundamental Python packages: Numpy, Scipy and Matplotlib. GalRotpy supports Python2.7.
The GalRotpy tool can give a first approximation of the galaxy rotation curve using the following schemas:
- bulge model uning a Miyamoto-Nagai potential,
- stellar or gaseous disk:
- thin or thick disks implementing Miyamoto-Nagai potentials, and/or
- an exponential disk model
- and finally the Dark Halo with a Navarro-Frenk-White (NFW) or with a Burkert potential.
The real time composition of rotation curves of disk-like galaxies is a simple and powerful method to:
- checking the presence of an assumed mass type component in a observed rotation curve,
- determine quantitatively the main mass contribution in a galaxy by means of the mass ratios of a given set of five potentials,
- to bound the contribution of each mass component given its radial and height scales.
The related pre-print reference: GalRotpy: an educational tool to understand and parametrize the rotation curve and gravitational potential of disk-like galaxies