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# A Photometric Study of the Ages and Metallicities of Early-type Galaxies in A 2218

## 1 Introduction

Studies using photometric, and more recently spectroscopic, observations of luminous elliptical galaxies in distant clusters have suggested that their luminosity and colour evolution is modest and consistent with passive evolution of stellar populations which are formed at high redshifts, $`z>2`$–4 (Aragon-Salamanca et al. 1993; Ellis et al. 1997; van Dokkum et al. 1998; Kodama et al. 1998; Kelson et al. 2000).

The relatively modest evolution seen in the luminous elliptical population in clusters contrasts with the claims of strong evolution in the morphological mix in these environments, specifically the ratio of S0 (lenticular) to elliptical galaxies. Using Hubble Space Telescope (HST ) imaging of ten clusters at $`z>0.3`$–0.6, Dressler et al. (1997) have uncovered a rapid increase in the ratio of S0 to elliptical galaxies towards the present day (see also Fasano et al. 2000). Assuming that the elliptical population is static, they interpret this as a strong rise in the S0 population, from 10–20% at $`z0.5`$ (6 Gyrs ago) to the 60% seen in present-day rich clusters. This apparent evolution applies to the cluster population brighter than about $`0.1L_V^{}`$.

By including information from spectroscopic observations of galaxies in ten clusters, Poggianti et al. (1999) proposed that the build-up of S0 galaxies identified by Dressler et al. (1997) resulted from the morphological transformation into lenticulars of accreted field spiral galaxies. They further suggested that the presence of a large population of red, apparently passive, galaxies with late-type morphologies in the clusters, along with absence of blue S0 galaxies, indicated that the morphological transformation occurs on a longer timescale than the decline in the star formation rates of the accreted field galaxies (see also Kodama & Smail 2000). Thus they proposed that the galaxies first suffered a decline in their star formation (probably resulting from stripping of their gas reservoirs as they encounter the dense intracluster medium within the cluster potential) and only then had their morphological appearance transformed (perhaps by a completely separate process, e.g. Moore, Lake & Katz 1998).

Nevertheless, if the morphological transformation occurs on a timescale of $`<2`$–3 Gyrs after the galaxy’s entry into the cluster it may still be possible to identify subtle signatures of this previous activity in the S0 population. Direct comparisons of the estimated stellar population ages for the S0 and elliptical populations can be particular powerful in this respect. When comparing the composite spectra of the S0 and elliptical populations in three clusters at $`z=0.3`$, Jones, Smail & Couch (2000) found no significant differences in the inferred luminosity-weighted ages of the stellar populations in the two classes at a median luminosity of $`0.6L_V^{}`$ and concluded that this supported the two-step transformation model discussed above. A similar degree of homogeneity between the cluster E and S0 galaxies was reported by Ellis et al. (1997) from their study of the restframe $`(UV)`$ colours of early-type galaxies in three clusters at $`z0.5`$, although again the strongest constraints were on the more luminous galaxies, $`0.2L_V^{}`$. However, a more detailed spectral-line analysis of individual lenticular and ellipticals in Fornax (Kuntschner 2000) has suggested that, in this cluster at least, the low luminosity lenticulars ($`<0.1L_V^{}`$) exhibit typically younger luminosity-weighted ages for their stellar populations than the ellipticals (see also Jorgensen 1999).

Work on the relative ages of cluster ellipticals and lenticulars continues using new combinations of spectral line indices to break the degeneracy between age and metallicity (Worthey 1994; Vazdekis & Arimoto 1999; Kuntschner 2000). At higher redshift such studies can be observationally expensive, requiring relatively large amounts of 4- and 8-m time and efficient multi-object spectrographs (Kelson et al. 1997; Jorgensen et al. 1999; Ziegler et al. 2000). However, recent developments in stellar population modelling (e.g. Vazdekis et al. 1997; Kodama & Arimoto 1997; Bruzual & Charlot 2000) have suggested that it may be possible to break the Age–Metallicity degeneracy using observationally cheaper photometric analyses if it includes both optical and near-infrared ($`H`$ or $`K`$) photometry (an idea originally proposed by Aaronson 1978, see Peletier & Balcells 1996 for an early demonstration). In this paper we explore this possibility using new, high-quality observations of the galaxy population in the core of the rich cluster A 2218 ($`z=0.17`$) from HST and the new INGRID near-infrared imager on the William Herschel Telescope (WHT). We derive precise optical and optical-infrared colours and morphologies for a large sample of galaxies across a 6 magnitude range in near-infrared luminosity down to $`K_s=19`$ ($`0.02L_K^{}`$) in this field and compare these to the predictions of the latest stellar evolutionary models. We also compare the constraints we derive for individual galaxies with the recent spectroscopic study of A 2218 by Ziegler et al. (2000). We discuss our observations and their reduction in the next section, present our results in §3 and our conclusions in §4. Throughout we assume $`q_o=0.5`$ and $`h=0.5`$ in units of 100 km s-1 Mpc-1. In this cosmology the look-back time to A 2218 is 3 Gyrs, the angular scale at the cluster is 1$`{}_{}{}^{\prime \prime }4.3`$ kpc and $`K_s^{}=14.8`$ (adopting $`M_K^{}=25.7`$).

## 2 Observations, Reduction and Analysis

### 2.1 HST Optical Imaging

The HST111This paper is based upon observations obtained with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope which is operated by STScI for the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under NASA contract NAS5-26555. imaging analysed here was obtained as part of the Early Release Observations (ERO) from WFPC2 after the SM-3a servicing mission in January 2000. The observations comprise 5 orbits in each of the F450W, F606W and F814W passbands, giving total integration times of 11.0 ks, 10.0 ks and 12.0 ks respectively. These exposures were each broken into 1000 s sub-exposures which were spatially offset from each other by sub-pixel shifts to allow drizzle-reconstruction of the frames to recover some of the information lost due to the undersampling of the HST PSF by the WFC pixel arrays.

The individual images were processed using the standard WFPC2 data pipeline and subsequently combined and cleaned of cosmic ray and other artifacts using drizzle and related software (Fruchter & Hook 1997) as implemented in iraf/stsdas . The final WFC images have an effective resolution (FWHM) of 0.17′′, 0.05′′-sampling and cover a field of 5.0 sq. arcmin. We adopt the photometric calibration of Holtzman et al. (1995) as given on the STScI web pages to calculate magnitudes in the Vega-based $`B_{450}`$/$`V_{606}`$/$`I_{814}`$ system. We use an average Gain Ratio of 1.988 for the three WFC chips, but note that for the colours based on the HST photometry the adopted Gain Ratio cancels out, and for the HST–INGRID colours the uncertainty it introduces is much smaller than the calibration error of the ground-based photometry. The 3-$`\sigma `$ point source sensitivities in the two passbands are then: $`B_{450}=28.8`$, $`V_{606}=29.0`$ and $`I_{814}=28.1`$. At the redshift of A 2218 these filters sample the cluster population in passbands roughly equivalent to restframe $`U`$, $`V`$ and $`R`$. We show a true-colour representation of the cluster as seen in the HST imaging in Figure 1.

### 2.2 INGRID Near-infrared Imaging

Our near-infrared observations come from the new INGRID imager on the 4.2-m WHT222Based on observations made with the William Herschel Telescope operated on the island of La Palma by the Isaac Newton Group in the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias (Packham et al. 2000). These observations were obtained in commissioning time during March 22–23, 2000. INGRID comprises a 10242 HAWAII-2 array at the bent-Cassegrain focus of the WHT, providing a 4.13 arcmin field of view with 0.242′′/pixel sampling.

Our exposures consist of a total of 8.3 ks integration in the $`K_s`$ filter obtained under photometric conditions in $`0.6`$–0.8′′ seeing. An additional 9.1 ks of $`J`$-band imaging was also obtained and we discuss this elsewhere (Smith et al. 2000). The $`K_s`$ frames consist of individual 20 s exposures which are co-added in hardware. These were reduced in a standard manner using a smoothed illumination correction derived from all the $`K_s`$ frames obtained during the night and then a local sky correction constructed from a running median of frames around a particular science frame. The frames were then aligned using integer-pixel shifts and combined using a cosmic-ray rejection algorithm to produce a final frame. The photometric calibration of these frames is obtained from exposures of UKIRT Faint Standards interspersed between the science observations. We estimate that our absolute calibration is good to 0.03 mags (including the uncertainty in the transformation from $`K`$ to $`K_s`$ for the faint standards, Persson et al. 1998). The final stacked $`K_s`$-band frame (approximately restframe $`H`$-band) has a 3-$`\sigma `$ point-source sensitivity, within the seeing disk, of $`K_s=22.0`$ and seeing of 0.75′′.

### 2.3 Galaxy Catalogue and Colours

To undertake our analysis we construct a $`K_s`$-selected galaxy catalogue. This achieves two goals – it minimises our sensitivity to differences in the previous star formation histories of the galaxies we are studying, and as the $`K_s`$ frames have effectively the shallowest limit, selecting in the $`K_s`$-band guarantees a sample with the most uniform optical-infrared colours and errors. Looking at the model grids shown in Figure 3 we can see that to differentiate between different stellar populations we require typical photometric errors of better than $`0.1`$ mag in $`(I_{814}K_s)`$. This imposes an effective $`K_s`$-band magnitude limit of $`K_s<19.0`$ on our sample, equivalent to $`M_K^{}+4.2`$ mags or roughly $`M_K=21.5`$ for early-type galaxies in A 2218.

We therefore ran SExtractor (Bertin & Arnouts 1996) on the final $`K_s`$ frame using a detection criteria of 10 pixels above the $`\mu _{K_s}=21.2`$ mag arcsec-2 isophote (1.5$`\sigma `$). To determine the total magnitudes of galaxies on this frame we use the best\_mag estimate from SExtractor and confirm that this provides a reliable ($`\delta K_s0.05`$) estimate of the total magnitudes using large-aperture photometry of several bright, isolated galaxies in the field. The SExtractor catalogue provides a list of 106 sources within the joint WFPC2–INGRID field down to our adopted limit of $`K_s=19`$. We discard 10 sources as being stellar on the basis of their morphologies in the F814W frame, a further 8 due to crowding (another $`K_s<19`$ source within 1–2 half-light radii) and 7 which exhibit gravitationally-lensed morphologies which obviously discount them from our analysis of the cluster population (an optical-infrared photometric analysis of the arcs and arclets seen in A 2218 will be presented by Smith et al. 2000). This leaves us with a final sample of 81 candidate cluster galaxies which are brighter than $`K_s=19`$ and relatively uncrowded, these galaxies are identified on Figure 1.

Morphologies of the galaxies in the A 2218 field were kindly provided by Prof. Warrick Couch based on the existing WFPC2 imaging in the F702W ($`R_{702}`$) passband presented by Kneib et al. (1996). These morphologies are on the revised Hubble scheme as used by the MORPHS project (Smail et al. 1997). We have chosen to use visual classifications for our analysis, rather than profile fitting, as all of the claims for morphological evolution of the galaxy populations of distant clusters have used visual estimates of the morphologies. Therefore any signatures of this evolution should appear in visually classified samples. The roll-angle and field centre for the earlier F702W observations were different from the ERO observations analysed here and so there is a slight mismatch in the field coverage between the two datasets. This results in 15 galaxies out of the 81 galaxies in our final $`K_s<19`$ sample lacking morphologies. Morphological classification of these galaxies was undertaken by one of us (IRS) from the F814W frame. These galaxies are identified by ID’s of 4000 and above in Table 1. The morphologies of the $`K_s<19`$ sample break down as: E: 31; E/S0: 3; S0: 28; Sa: 5; late-type spirals: 14. The core of A 2218 thus exhibits an observed S0-to-E ratio, $`N_{\mathrm{S0}}/N_\mathrm{E}1`$, close to that expected from the evolutionary rate proposed by Dressler et al. (1997), and a large deficit of S0 galaxies compared to the ratio seen in local clusters, $`N_{\mathrm{S0}}/N_\mathrm{E}2.3`$. Within the framework of the S0-transformation model we would expect that roughly half of the S0 population we see in A 2218 had their morphologies transformed since $`z0.5`$.

To determine representative colours for these galaxies we have chosen to measure photometry from the seeing-matched frames within an aperture whose radius is three times the half-light radius of the galaxy. The half-light radii, $`r_{hl}`$, we quote are simply the radius of a circle containing half the total light of a galaxy on the F814W frame. To estimate the total magnitudes we use the SExtractor best\_mag measurements and correct these to ‘total’ magnitudes using 8.0′′-diameter aperture photometry of isolated early-type galaxies on the frame. This correction amounts to $`0.05\pm 0.01`$ mag. A comparison of our half-light radii with the effective radii published by Jorgensen et al. (1999) and Ziegler et al. (2000) from their analyses of the HST F702W-band frame shows reasonable agreement, $`<20`$% scatter. The median half-light radius reaches 0.4′′ (equivalent to the ground-based seeing) by our limit of $`K_s=19`$. For the galaxies with half-light radii below 0.4′′ (14/81) we have chosen to use a fixed aperture of 2.4′′ diameter.

Figure 2. Colour-magnitude diagrams for the $`K_s<19`$ sample showing their $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$, $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ and $`(I_{814}K_s)`$ colours as a function of total $`K_s`$ magnitude. The points are coded on the basis of their optical morphology given in the key. Note the tight sequences exhibited by the colours of the early-type galaxies, especially in $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$.

To measure the colours of the galaxies we aligned and resampled the HST frames to the coordinate system defined by the INGRID $`K_s`$ frame to a tolerance of $`0.1^{\prime \prime }`$. We then matched the effective PSF on the HST and ground-based frames using an iterative gaussian-convolution technique based on the PSF profiles within the same $`3r_{hl}`$ radius used in our analysis. For each galaxy we measure the $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$, $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ and $`(I_{814}K_s)`$ colours within the adopted apertures. To judge the sensitivity of our colours to the PSF correction we have reanalysed our frames using PSF convolutions at either extreme of the range of acceptable values and have determined that the $`(I_{814}K_s)`$ colours, which have the strongest sensitivity to this correction, vary by less than 0.02 mags. We have also remeasured the colours using apertures which are twice the half-light radii and determine that the distribution of the early-type population on the colour–colour planes does not significantly alter, with systematic changes in the colours of $`<0.02`$ mags.

We list the aperture photometry for our sample, along with the errors estimated from photon-counting statistics and the variance of the sky background, our best-estimate of the total $`K_s`$ magnitudes and the half-light radii in Table 1. Table 1 also gives the positions of all the galaxies, this astrometry is tied to the APM coordinate system and has positional accuracy of $`<0.5^{\prime \prime }`$ rms. We illustrate the colour-magnitude relations for the galaxies in the different passbands in Figure 2. The estimated galactic extinction for this field from Schlegel et al. (1998) is $`E(BV)=0.024`$, giving $`E(B_{450}I_{814})=0.058`$, $`E(V_{606}I_{814})=0.034`$, $`E(I_{814}K_s)=0.038`$ and $`A_K=0.01`$. We correct all colours for extinction but have not corrected the total $`K_s`$-band magnitudes. Adopting the Burstein & Heiles (1982) estimate of the extinction reduces the reddening corrections by 25% – or at most 0.01 mags.

### 2.4 Archival Spectroscopy

We expect that field galaxies are likely to comprise a relatively modest fraction of our $`K_s`$-selected sample given the richness and redshift of the cluster we are observing (especially for the early-type galaxies). Nevertheless, we have searched for spectroscopic confirmation of the membership of the galaxies in our sample. The primary sources for this information are Le Borgne, Pello & Sanahuja (1992), Jorgensen et al. (1999) and Ziegler et al. (2000). We find a total of 33 of the 81 galaxies in our sample have spectroscopic redshifts. We list the identifications for these galaxies and their redshifts in Table 1, following the naming convention from NED333The NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration..

Of the 33 spectroscopically identified galaxies only two are non-members, and only one of these (#4010) has an early-type morphology – indicating a field contamination of 3% (for the typically brighter galaxies above the spectroscopic limits). The observed colours of #4010 project it onto the sequence of metal-rich, luminous ellipticals in the cluster. Three other much fainter ellipticals also appear in this region (identified by their large photometric errors in Fig. 4c) and we suggest that these probably represent background field galaxies, although this requires spectroscopic confirmation. The morphological breakdown of the spectroscopic members is: 17/31 E’s, 1/3 E/S0’s, 13/28 S0’s and 2/5 Sa’s, showing that we have confirmed membership for roughly 40% of the early-type galaxies in our field. In addition, 14 of the early-type galaxies in our sample have high signal-to-noise, moderate resolution spectroscopy available from Ziegler et al. (2000). We discuss these galaxies in more detail in the next section.

### 2.5 Stellar Population Models

We compare the observed colours of the galaxies with the predictions from Bruzual & Charlot’s (2000) population synthesis code. The single stellar population (SSP, a stellar population with a single metallicity and age) model grids are calculated for six different metallicities (\[M/H\]$`=`$2.3, $``$1.7, $``$0.7, $``$0.4, 0.0, and $`+`$0.4) and eight ages ($`T=1`$, 1.5, 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 15 Gyrs). We assume a Salpeter (1955) initial mass function ($`x=1.35`$) with lower and upper mass cut-offs of 0.1 and 100 M. The colours are calculated in the observer’s frame at the cluster redshift ($`z=0.17`$) by redshifting the SSP spectra and convolving these with the filter response functions.

As shown in Figure 3, the Age–Metallicity degeneracy can be broken by combining a rest-frame optical colour and a rest-frame optical-infrared colour. This is because the optical-infrared colour (e.g. $`(I_{814}K_s)`$) of an old stellar population ($`>1`$ Gyr) is primarily determined by the temperature of the red giant branch which is much more sensitive to the metallicity than the age of the stellar populations (Table 2). In contrast, an optical colour (e.g. $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$) is sensitive to both age and metallicity in accordance with the predictions of Worthey’s (1994) 2/3 law. Bluer optical colours which sample the restframe near-ultraviolet (e.g. $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$ at $`z=0.17`$) are slightly more sensitive to the metallicity than the 2/3 law suggests, since this colour brackets the rest-frame 4000Å break which is sensitive to metal lines (e.g. Fe and Ca HK). Therefore the best combination to break the Age–Metallicity degeneracy for a cluster at $`z0.2`$ is $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ versus $`(I_{814}K_s)`$.

## 3 Results and Discussion

We show the three colour–magnitude diagrams for our sample in Figure 2. These illustrate the wide range in luminosity covered in our analysis, nearly 6 magnitudes, with the elliptical and lenticular galaxies evenly spread across this range, except for the brightest two galaxies which are both ellipticals. This figure also shows the relatively homogeneous colours of the majority of the galaxies in our sample. The combined elliptical and lenticular sample exhibits a scatter around their mean relations of 0.11 mag in $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$, 0.17 mag in $`(I_{814}K_s)`$ and a mere 0.03 mag in $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$. However, this scatter is still significantly larger than the mean errors in these colours: $`\delta (B_{450}I_{814})=0.02`$, $`\delta (I_{814}K_s)=0.03`$ and $`\delta (V_{606}I_{814})=0.01`$. As we show next, the high precision of our photometry of the early-type galaxies in A 2218 means that we can analyse the small scatter shown in their colours to uncover differences in their stellar populations.

In Figure 3 we show the two colour–colour diagrams based on the $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$ and $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ comparisons with $`(I_{814}K_s)`$. We overplot on this figure the grid of models for a range of ages and metallicities (as described in §2.5). We indicate in both panels the effects on the observed colours of increasing reddening and redshift (for early-type SEDs). The redshift vector suggests that the fainter end of our sample could suffer field contamination from foreground low-luminosity, but metal-rich, early-type galaxies. This combination of properties is sufficiently rare and the foreground volume small enough that we do not expect contamination to be a major problem in our analysis.

A comparison of the model grids and the observations in Figure 3 shows good agreement between the regions of the colour–colour plane populated by the observations and those where galaxies are expected to lie on the basis of the stellar population models. However, comparing the ‘orthogonality’ of the age and metallicity tracks on the two colour–colour planes in Figure 3 we can see that the $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ grid provides a better differentiation between age and metallicity than $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$ as expected from the discussion in §2.5. Hence, for the remainder of our analysis we will concentrate on the $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$$`(I_{814}K_s)`$ colour–colour plane and compare the detailed distribution of the galaxies on it to the model tracks.

The dominant feature in the $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ panel in Figure 3 (and also shown by the $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$ plot) is a tight locus of points in the region of the grid corresponding to the oldest and most metal rich stellar populations. These galaxies are typically the brightest early-type galaxies in the cluster (Fig. 2). Their locus traces what appears to be a metallicity sequence – spanning a range of $`0.5`$ dex in \[M/H\] – at a single age ($`7`$ Gyrs – although the uncertainty in the metallicities and the relative calibration of the colours and grids means that the reader should view the ages as defined on a relative rather than an absolute scale). This can be more clearly seen in Figure 4, which illustrates the $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$$`(I_{814}K_s)`$ distributions for the morphologically classified elliptical and lenticular galaxies (we place the three E/S0 galaxies into the latter sample). The fainter galaxies (identified by the larger photometric errors) extend this sequence to lower \[M/H\], but also appear to show a wider spread in ages. Indeed a number of the faintest elliptical galaxies fall just outside the region covered by the model predictions, although their photometric errors are sufficiently large that we do not view this as a major concern. Unfortunately none of these galaxies have spectroscopic information to confirm their cluster membership.

To confirm the reliability of our analysis we compare our results for the 14 galaxies in common with the spectroscopic sample of Ziegler et al. (2000). We note that these galaxies are typically the brighter ones in our sample, with a median magnitude of $`K_s=15.1`$, the faintest having $`K_s=16.3`$ ($`0.25L_K^{}`$). We find that most of the galaxies are consistent in both analyses with a single age ($`7`$–8 Gyrs) and a range of metallicity. However, one galaxy stands out in our sample – #449, the bluest, confirmed elliptical member in Figure 4b – the luminosity-weighted age we derive for the stellar population in this galaxy is a mere 3 Gyr (suggesting that the stellar population which currently dominates the galaxy’s luminosity was formed at a redshift of only $`z<0.5`$). This galaxy also stands out in Ziegler et al.’s analysis as by far the youngest galaxy in the joint sample, with an estimated age of around $`1.5`$ Gyrs. This comparison with the results of the more traditional spectroscopic approach clearly supports the reliability of the optical/near-infrared photometric technique for analysing the stellar populations of early-type galaxies in distant clusters. Moreover, the photometric method requires only a fraction of the time needed for spectroscopic surveys and can probe to fainter luminosities.

Turning back to Figure 4 we now compare the colours of the different morphological subsamples. The sequence defined by the redder and more luminous galaxies appears in both the E and E/S0+S0 subsamples, as well as in the spectroscopically-confirmed members. There maybe a slight tendency for the bright E/S0+S0 sample to show a wider age spread than the E’s ($`\sigma _T(\mathrm{S0})=2.2`$ Gyrs versus $`\sigma _T(\mathrm{E})=0.8`$ Gyrs at $`K_s<16.0`$). The likelihood of this difference in dispersions arising by chance from the joint sample is only slight, $`\mathrm{log}_{10}(P)=3.1`$. However, this comparison is very sensitive to the exact magnitude limit used.

Nevertheless, there is an even more striking difference between the two morphological subsamples at the lowest luminosities. To emphasise the variation in the properties of the lowest luminosity galaxies we show in Figure 5 the colour–colour plot for the fainter ($`K_s>17`$, $`<0.1L_K^{}`$) early-type galaxies. Here, while the faint ellipticals appear to extend the metallicity sequence defined by the brighter ellipticals (and S0’s), the fainter S0 galaxies show an almost orthogonal colour–colour relationship to that exhibited by the faint ellipticals and all the more luminous galaxies (qualitatively similar behaviour is seen in the equivalent $`(B_{450}I_{814})`$ plot). This reversal in the colour trends results from the appearance of a population of faint S0 with relatively blue $`(V_{606}I_{814})`$ colours, indicating luminosity-weighted mean ages of only 2–5 Gyrs for the stellar populations in these galaxies and metallicities of \[M/H\] $`0.2`$. It is unlikely that all of the stars in these galaxies were formed in the most recent star formation event and hence the luminosity-weighted ages are in fact upper limits on the epoch of the most recent star formation.

To quantify the prevelance of this population we arbitrarily define ‘young’ as a luminosity-weighted age of $`<5`$ Gyrs and find that half of the $`K_s>17`$ S0 galaxies are young (or 30% of the whole S0 population, Fig. 6), in contrast none of the faint E’s fall in this category. This is a high enough proportion of the S0 population (given the duration of the ‘young’ phase) to suggest that most of the faint lenticular galaxies in the cluster must have passed through this phase. To quantify the extent of any possible luminosity bias in our analysis we determine that the fading by the present-day of the stellar populations of the young S0 galaxies should not exceed 0.2 mags in $`K_s`$ compared to the more luminous, evolved galaxies in the cluster (Smail et al. 1998; Kodama & Bower 2000). Taking this modest luminosity bias into account we find that it would reduce the proportion of ‘young’ S0s in an unbiased sample by only 5%.

Figure 5. This plot compares the distribution of the faintest early-type galaxies ($`K_s>17`$) in our sample to the predictions of the stellar population models. The striking difference in the distribution of faint E and S0 galaxies is obvious.

The behaviour exhibited by the faint lenticular population is very similar to that seen in the ‘UV+’ galaxies identified in a photometric survey of X-ray luminous clusters at $`z0.2`$ by Smail et al. (1998). Their relatively shallow ground-based imaging lacked the precision necessary for an analysis of the type undertaken here. Nevertheless, they used the increased sensitivity to differences in the stellar populations available from their $`(UB)`$ colours to identify a class of UV-bright galaxies which showed strong 4000Å breaks (‘UV+’) indicative of evolved stellar populations. They suggested that these UV+ galaxies represented the fading progenitors of the cluster S0 population. The UV+ class constitute around 50% of the faint cluster population ($`<0.1L_V^{}`$) which exhibit strong 4000Å breaks. Based on the HST imaging of a handful of the UV+ galaxies in the core of A 2390, Smail et al. (1998) suggest that the majority of these galaxies have S0 morphologies. The luminosities, colours and morphologies of the UV+ population are thus similar to the faint, blue S0 population identified here. Interestingly, Smail et al. (1998) found that the radial profile of the UV+ population is indistinguishable from that of the luminous, evolved galaxies in these clusters suggesting that these galaxies are not recent additions to the cluster population.

We finally discuss the characteristics of the S0 population in the context of the morphological evolution discussed by Dressler et al. (1997) and Poggianti et al. (1999). The evolution in the number of S0 galaxies in clusters at $`z>0.3`$–0.6 observed by Dressler et al. (1997) suggests that roughly two-thirds of the S0 population in a $`z=0.17`$ cluster would have transformed their morphologies in the last 3 Gyrs (since $`z0.5`$), with half of these occuring in the last 1–2 Gyrs. Adopting a 1–2 Gyr delay between the termination of star formation and the morphological transformation occuring, as is needed to explain the lack of blue S0 galaxies in the distant clusters and the large number of passive galaxies with late-type morphologies (Poggianti et al. 1999; Kodama & Smail 2000), then we would expect that 60–70% of the S0 galaxies in A 2218 were forming stars 4–5 Gyrs prior to $`z=0.17`$ and 30% of them within the last 2–3 Gyrs. To estimate the luminosity-weighted ages for the composite stellar populations in these galaxies at a later time we need to assume a model for their previous star formation. If we assume that these progenitors were forming stars at a constant rate (or slightly declining) since their formation at high redshift, as normal early and mid-type spiral galaxies are believed to do, then for the 30% of the S0 population which is predicted to have had terminated its star formation in the 2–3 Gyrs before $`z=0.17`$ (equivalent to $`z0.5`$ in the cosmology we adopt) they would have luminosity-weighted ages of $`<5`$ Gyrs when seen at $`z=0.17`$. This model is thus consistent with the 30% fraction of the S0 population which we observe to have luminosity-weighted ages of $`<5`$ Gyrs. Indeed, the smooth growth of the S0 fraction in the clusters reported by Dressler et al. (1997) is also mirrored by the nearly flat distribution of estimated ages for this population seen in Figure 6. Therefore, our observations support a scenario where the fraction of S0s in the clusters is smoothly increasing as a result of a slow morphological and spectroscopic transformation of star forming spiral galaxies into passive, S0 cluster members.

Figure 6. The cumulative distributions of the estimated luminosity-weighted relative ages of the full elliptical and lenticular samples. Note the relatively flat distribution of derived ages for the S0+E/S0 sample compared to the more uniform and older ages seen in the ellipticals, where the mean stellar populations in 80% of the galaxies are older than 7 Gyrs. We stress that these estimated ages should be viewed as relative rather than absolute values.

## 4 Conclusions

$``$ We present precise optical and near-infrared photometry of a sample of 81 galaxies in the core regions of the rich cluster A 2218 at $`z=0.17`$ (a lookback time of 3 Gyrs).

$``$ We compare the optical and optical-infrared colours of the morphologically-classified early-type galaxies in our sample with the predictions of stellar population models spanning a range in metallicity and age. The models show good agreement in the regions of the colour–colour plane which are populated by the observational data.

$``$ By comparing our results with those from a recent spectroscopic survey of the stellar populations in galaxies in A 2218, we confirm the reliability of the photometric analysis technique. We show that both techniques identify galaxies with relatively young stellar populations.

$``$ The colours of the more luminous early-type galaxies ($`>0.5L_K^{}`$) in the cluster are well described by a sequence of varying metallicity for the stellar population at a constant age. This is in agreement with the results of the analysis of the spectral line strengths in similar luminosity galaxies in A 2218 (Ziegler et al. 2000) and results from the spectroscopic and photometric analysis of galaxies in higher redshift clusters (Kodama & Arimoto 1997; Jones, Smail & Couch 2000).

$``$ In contrast the faintest early-type galaxies ($`<0.1L_K^{}`$) show a large spread in their optical and optical-infrared colours. Around 30% of the S0 galaxies in A 2218 (and half of the fainter examples) exhibit mean luminosity-weighted ages for their stellar populations of $`<5`$ Gyrs. This suggests that these galaxies were actively forming stars at $`z<0.5`$. The proportion of these ‘young’ S0 galaxies is consistent with the rate of evolution of the S0 fraction in distant clusters reported by Dressler et al. (1997). Further support for the gradual growth of the S0 population comes from the relatively flat age distribution we derive for these galaxies. In contrast the vast majority of the morphologically-classified elliptical galaxies across all luminosities show evolved stellar populations.

$``$ Most of the galaxies we see which show signs of recent activity lie below the magnitude limits reached by spectroscopic studies of galaxies in distant clusters. This highlights the urgent need to exploit the increased sensitivity available with 8-m telescopes to measure detailed line indices in low-luminosity members of intermediate and moderate redshift clusters.

$``$ We have demonstrated the power of photometric analysis of the optical–infrared colours of early-type cluster galaxies to uncover information about their star formation histories. This type of precision photometric analysis should be extended to more distant clusters (in which it is predicted that a higher fraction of the S0 galaxies should show signs of past star formation activity) and to wider fields at intermediate redshifts to search for the signatures of the physical processes responsible for the spectroscopic and morphological transformations at the heart of the formation of S0 galaxies.

## Acknowledgements

We thank Richard Bower, Warrick Couch, Roger Davies, Bianca Poggianti, Ray Sharples and Alex Vazdekis for useful conversations and help. IRS acknowledges support from the Royal Society. HK and GPS acknowledge support from PPARC. TK acknowledges support through a Research Fellowship for Young Scientists from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.


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1. Introduction

Appell introduced four families of hypergeometric functions of two variables in 1880’s. Soon, he applied them in a solution of the Tisserand problem in the celestial mechanics. The Appell functions have several other applications, for example in the theory of algebraic equations, algebraic surfaces… The aim of this paper is to point out the relationship between the Appell functions $`F_4`$ and another subject from classical mechanics - separability of variables in the Hamilton - Jacobi equations.

The equation

$$\lambda V_{xy}+3\left(yV_xxV_y\right)+(y^2x^2)V_{xy}+xy\left(V_{xx}V_{yy}\right)=0,$$
$`1`$
appeared in Kozlov’s paper  as a condition on function $`V=V(x,y)`$ to be an integrable perturbation of certain type for billiard systems inside an ellipse

$$\frac{x^2}{A}+\frac{y^2}{B}=1,\lambda =AB.$$
$`2`$
This equation is a special case of the Bertrand-Darboux equation

$`(V_{yy}V_{xx})(`$ $`2axyb^{}ybx+c_1)+2V_{xy}(ay^2ax^2+byb^{}x+cc^{})`$ $`3`$
$`+V_x(6ay+3b)+V_y(6ax3b^{})=0.`$
It corresponds to the choise $`a=1/2,`$ $`b=b^{}=c_1=0,`$ $`cc^{}=\lambda /2.`$ The Bertrand-Darboux equation represents the necessary and suficient condition for a natural mechanical system with two degrees of freedom

$$H=\frac{1}{2}(p_x^2+p_y^2)+V(x,y)$$

to be separable in the elliptical coordinates or some of their degenerations.

The solutions of the equation (1) in a form of the Laurent polynomials in $`x,y`$ were described in . The starting observation of this paper, that such solutions are simply related to the well-known hypergeometric functions of the Appell type is presented in the section 3. Such a relation automatically gives a wider class of solutions of the equation (1). But what is more important, it shows the existence of the connection between separability of the classical systems on one hand, and the theory of hypergeometric functions on the other one. The basic references for the Appell functions are . Further, in section 3, the similar formulae for potential perturbations for the Jacobi problem for geodesics on ellipsoid from  and for the billiard systems on the surfaces with constant curvature from , are given.

In the case of more than two degrees of freedom, the natural generalization for the equation (1) is system (4). The system (4) for the three degrees of freedom was derived in  in a connection with the billiard systems inside an ellipsoid in $`R^3`$ and the Laurent polynomial solutions were given. In section 4, we express these solutions for a symmeric ellipsoid through the hypergeometric functions. Surprisingly, we obtain again the Appell hypergeometric functions of two variables. The number of degrees of freedom increased but the number of variables of the hypergeometric functions didn’t!

The system

$`(a_ia_r)^1\left(x_i^2V_{rs}x_ix_rV_{is}\right)=(a_ia_s)^1\left(x_i^2V_{rs}x_ix_sV_{ir}\right)irsi;`$ $`4`$
$`(a_ia_r)^1x_ix_r\left(V_{ii}V_{rr}\right){\displaystyle \underset{ji,r}{}}(a_ia_j)^1x_ix_jV_{jr}`$
$`+V_{ir}\left[{\displaystyle \underset{ji,r}{}}(a_ia_j)^1x_j^2+(a_ra_i)^1(x_i^2x_r^2)\right]+V_{ir}`$
$`+3(a_ia_r)^1\left(x_rV_ix_iV_r\right)=0,ir,`$
where $`V_i=V/x_i`$, of $`(n1)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n}{2}\right)`$ equations was formulated in  for arbitrary number of degrees of freedom $`n`$. In  the generalization of the Bertrand-Darboux theorem was proved. According to that theorem, the solutions of the system (4) are potentials separable in generalized elliptic coordinates (see the Theorem after lemma 2, below).

Some deeper explanation of the connection between the separability in the elliptic coordinates and the Appell hypergeometric functions is not known yet.

2. Basic notations

The function $`F_4`$ is one of the four hypergeometric functions in two variables introduced by Appell  and defined as a serries:

$$F_4(a,b,c,d;x,y)=\frac{(a)_{m+n}(b)_{m+n}}{(c)_m(d)_n}\frac{x^m}{m!}\frac{y^n}{n!},$$

where $`(a)_n`$ is a standard Pochhammer symbol:

$`(a)_n`$ $`={\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }(a+n)}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(a)}}=a(a+1)\mathrm{}(a+n1),`$
$`(a)_0`$ $`=1,`$
(For example $`m!=(1)_m.`$)

The series $`F_4`$ is covergent for $`\sqrt{x}+\sqrt{y}1.`$ The functions $`F_4`$ can be continued to the solutions of the equations:

$`x(1x){\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{x^2}}y^2{\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{y^2}}`$ $`2xy{\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{xy}}+[c(a+b+1)x]{\displaystyle \frac{F}{x}}`$
$`(a+b+1)y{\displaystyle \frac{F}{y}}abF=0,`$
$`y(1y){\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{y^2}}x^2{\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{x^2}}`$ $`2xy{\displaystyle \frac{^2F}{xy}}+[c^{}(a+b+1)y]{\displaystyle \frac{F}{y}}`$
$`(a+b+1)x{\displaystyle \frac{F}{x}}abF=0,`$
3. The separable systems with two degrees of freedom

Billiard inside an ellipse

Following  we will start with a billiard system which describes a particle moving freely within an ellipse (2). At the boundary we assume elastic reflections with equal impact and reflection angles. This system is completely integrable and it has an additional integral

$$K_1=\frac{\dot{x}^2}{A}+\frac{\dot{y}^2}{B}\frac{(\dot{x}y\dot{y}x)^2}{AB}.$$

We are interested in a potential perturbations $`V=V(x,y)`$ such that the perturbated system has an integral $`\stackrel{~}{K}_1`$ of the form

$$\stackrel{~}{K}_1=K_1+k_1(x,y),$$

where $`k_1=k_1(x,y)`$ depends only on coordinates. This specific condition leeds to the equation (1) on $`V`$ (see ).

In  the Laurent polynomial solutions of the equation (1) were given. The basic set of solutions consists of the functions

$$V_k=\underset{i=0}{\overset{k2}{}}(1)^i\underset{s=1}{\overset{ki1}{}}U_{kis}(x,y,\lambda ,\alpha )+\alpha y^{2k},kN,$$

$$W_k=\underset{i=0}{\overset{k2}{}}\underset{s=1}{\overset{ki1}{}}(1)^sU_{kis}(y,x,\lambda ,\alpha )+\alpha x^{2k},kN,$$

where

$$U_{kis}=\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{s+i1}{i}\right)\frac{[1(ki)][2(ki)]\mathrm{}[s(ki)]}{\lambda ^{s+i}s!}\alpha x^{2s}y^{2k+2i}.$$

Now, we are going to rewrite the above formulae:

$`V_k`$ $`={\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{k2}{}}}(1)^i{\displaystyle \underset{s=1}{\overset{ki1}{}}}U_{kis}(x,y,\lambda ,\alpha )+\alpha y^{2k},kN`$
$`={\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{k2}{}}}(1)^i{\displaystyle \underset{s=1}{\overset{ki1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }(s+i)\mathrm{\Gamma }(s+ik+1)}{\mathrm{\Gamma }(i+1)\mathrm{\Gamma }(s)\mathrm{\Gamma }(ik+1)\mathrm{\Gamma }(s+1)}}x^{2s}y^{2(ik)}+y^{2k}`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{y^{2k}}}\left({\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{k2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{s=1}{\overset{ki1}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{s+i1}(2k)_{s+i1}}{i!(1)_{s1}s!(1k)_i}}x^{2s}(y^2)^i+1\right)`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{y^{2k}}}\left(x^2{\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{k2}{}}}{\displaystyle \underset{s=0}{\overset{ki2}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{s+i}(2k)_{s+i}}{(2)_s(1k)_i}}{\displaystyle \frac{(x^2)^s}{s!}}{\displaystyle \frac{(y^2)^i}{i!}}+1\right)`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{1}{\stackrel{~}{y}^k}}\left(\stackrel{~}{x}F_4(1;2k;2,1k,\stackrel{~}{x},\stackrel{~}{y})+1\right),`$
where $`\stackrel{~}{x}=x^2,\stackrel{~}{y}=y^2`$, and $`F_4`$ is the Appell function. We just obtained the simple formula which expresses the potentials $`V_k`$, for $`kN`$ from  through the Appell functions. We can use this formula to spread the family of solutions of the equation (1) out of the set of the Laurent polynomials.

Let $`V(x,y)=a_{nm}x^ny^m`$. Then the equation (1) reduces to

$$nma_{n,m}=(n+m)(ma_{n2,m}na_{n,m2}).$$
$`5`$
If one of the indices, for example the first one, belongs to $`Z`$, then $`V`$ doesn’t have essential singularities. Put $`a_{0,2\gamma }=1`$, where $`\gamma `$ is not necessary an integer.

If we define

$$a_{\underset{n}{\underset{}{2s+2}},\underset{m}{\underset{}{2i2\gamma }}}=\frac{(1)^i(1)_{s+i}(2\gamma )_{s+i}}{(2)_s(1\gamma )_is!i!}.$$
$`6`$
it can easily be seen that (6) is a solution of the eqation (5). So, let us denote

$$V_\gamma =\stackrel{~}{y}^\gamma \left(\stackrel{~}{x}F_4(1,2\gamma ,2,1\gamma ,\stackrel{~}{x},\stackrel{~}{y})+1\right).$$
$`7`$
Then we have

Theorem 1 Every function $`V_\gamma `$ given with (7) and $`\gamma C`$ is a solution of the equation (1).

Mechanical interpretation: with $`\gamma R^{}`$ and the coefficient multiplying $`V_\gamma `$ positive, we have potential barrier along $`x`$-axis; so we can consider a cut along negative part of $`y`$-axis.

The Jacobi problem for geodesics on an ellipsoid

The Jacobi problem for the geodesics on an ellipsoid

$$\frac{x^2}{A}+\frac{y^2}{B}+\frac{z^2}{C}=1$$

has an additional integral

$$K_1=(\frac{x^2}{A^2}+\frac{y^2}{B^2}+\frac{z^2}{C^2})(\frac{\dot{x}^2}{A}+\frac{\dot{y}^2}{B}+\frac{\dot{z}^2}{C}).$$

The potential perturbations $`V=V(x,y,z)`$ such that perturbated systems have the integrals of the form

$$\stackrel{~}{K}_1=K_1+k(x,y,z)$$

satisfy the following system (see )

$`\left({\displaystyle \frac{x^2}{A^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{y^2}{B^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{C^2}}\right)V_{xy}{\displaystyle \frac{AB}{AB}}3{\displaystyle \frac{y}{B^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_x}{A}}+3{\displaystyle \frac{x}{A^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_y}{B}}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{x^2}{A^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{y^2}{B^3}}\right)V_{xy}+`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{xy}{AB}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{V_{yy}}{A}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{xx}}{B}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{zx}{CA^2}}V_{zy}{\displaystyle \frac{zy}{CB^2}}V_{zx}=0`$
$`\left({\displaystyle \frac{x^2}{A^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{y^2}{B^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{C^2}}\right)V_{yz}{\displaystyle \frac{BC}{BC}}3{\displaystyle \frac{z}{C^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_y}{B}}+3{\displaystyle \frac{y}{B^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_z}{C}}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{y^2}{B^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{C^3}}\right)V_{yz}+`$ $`8`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{yz}{BC}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{V_{zz}}{B}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{yy}}{C}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{xy}{AB^2}}V_{xz}{\displaystyle \frac{xz}{AC^2}}V_{xy}=0`$
$`\left({\displaystyle \frac{x^2}{A^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{y^2}{B^2}}+{\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{C^2}}\right)V_{zx}{\displaystyle \frac{CA}{AC}}3{\displaystyle \frac{x}{A^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_z}{C}}+3{\displaystyle \frac{z}{C^2}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_x}{A}}+\left({\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{C^3}}{\displaystyle \frac{x^2}{A^3}}\right)V_{zx}+`$
$`+{\displaystyle \frac{xz}{AC}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{V_{xx}}{C}}{\displaystyle \frac{V_{zz}}{A}}\right)+{\displaystyle \frac{zy}{BC^2}}V_{xy}{\displaystyle \frac{yx}{BA^2}}V_{yz}=0`$
The system (8) replaces in this problem the equation (1). The solutions of the system in the Laurent polynomial form were found in . We can transform them in a following way.

$`V_{l_0}(x,y,z)={\displaystyle \underset{0ks,k+cl_0}{}}(1)^s\left({\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{s+k1}{k}}\right)(x^2)^{l_0+k}(y^2)^s(z^2)^{l_0(k+s)1}`$
$`\times {\displaystyle \frac{c^{s+k}(ca)^s(cb)^k2^{k+s}(l_0+1)\mathrm{}(l_0+(k+s))}{b^ka^s(ba)^{k+s}2^s2^ks!(l_0+1)\mathrm{}(l_0+k)}}(z^2)^{l_0(k+s)1}`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{(s+k1)!(l_0+1)(l_0+2)_{s+k1}(z^2)^{l_0}}{k!(s1)!s!(l_0+1)_k(x^2)^{l_0}}\left[\frac{x^2c(ac)}{z^2(ba)a}\right]^s\left[\frac{y^2c(cb)}{z^2(ba)b}\right]^k}`$
$`=(l_0+1)\left({\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{x^2}}\right)^{l_0}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{s+k1}(l_0+2)_{s+k1}}{(2)_{s1}(l_0+1)_k}\widehat{x}^s\widehat{y}^k}`$
$`=(l_0+1)\left({\displaystyle \frac{z^2}{x^2}}\right)^{l_0}F_4(1;l_0+2;2,l_0+1,\widehat{x},\widehat{y}),`$
where

$$\frac{x^2c(ac)}{z^2(ba)a}=\widehat{x},\frac{y^2c(cb)}{z^2(ba)b}=\widehat{y}$$

In the above formulae $`l_0`$ was an integer. We have strightforward generalization:

Theorem 2. For every $`\gamma C`$ the function

$$V_\gamma =(\gamma +1)\left(\frac{z^2}{x^2}\right)^\gamma F_4(1;\gamma +2;2,\gamma +1,\widehat{x},\widehat{y}),$$

is a solution of the system (8).

Billiard systems on the constant curvature surfaces

Potential perturbations of the billiard systems on the constant curvature surfaces were analysed in . Following the notation from , let the billiard $`D_S`$ be a subset of the surface $`\mathrm{\Sigma }_S,`$ of the curvature $`S=+1`$ or $`S=1,`$ bounded with the quadric $`Q_S`$, where

$`\mathrm{\Sigma }_+`$ $`=\{r=(x,y,z)R^3|r,r_+=1\},r_1,r_2_+=x_1y_1+x_2y_2+x_3y_3;`$
$`\mathrm{\Sigma }_{}`$ $`=\{r=(x,y,z)R^3|r,r_{}=1,z>0\},r_1,r_2_{}=x_1y_1+x_2y_2x_3y_3;`$
$`Q_S`$ $`=\mathrm{\Sigma }_S\{rR^3|Qr,r_s=0\}\mathrm{},Q=\text{diag}({\displaystyle \frac{1}{A}},{\displaystyle \frac{1}{B}},{\displaystyle \frac{1}{C}}).`$
Then the billiard system has the integral

$$K=\frac{(\dot{x}y\dot{y}x)^2}{AB}+S\frac{(\dot{x}z\dot{z}x)^2}{AC}+S\frac{(\dot{z}y\dot{y}z)^2}{BC}$$

As before we are looking for potentials $`V=V(x,y,z)`$ such that the pertubated system has an integral of the form

$$\stackrel{~}{K}=K+k(x,y,z).$$

In this case the condition is given by the system :

$`3CyV_x`$ $`3CxV_y+V_{xy}(C(y^2x^2)+Kz^2(BA))`$
$`+cxyV_{xx}cxyV_{yy}+azyV_{zx}bzxV_{zy}=0,`$
$`3BzV_x`$ $`K3BxV_z+V_{xz}(B(z^2Kx^2)+Ky^2(CA))`$ $`10`$
$`+BzxV_{xx}KBzxV_{zz}+AzyV_{xy}KCyxV_{yz}=0,`$
$`3AzV_y`$ $`K3AyV_z+V_{yz}(A(z^2Ky^2)+Kx^2(CB))`$
$`+AzyV_{yy}KAzyV_{zz}+BzxV_{xy}KCxyV_{xz}=0.`$
Starting from the solutions from

$$\frac{V_{l_0}=\frac{1}{z^{2l_0}}}{0kl_010ml_0k1a_{m,k}x^{2m}y^{2l_022k2m}z^{2k},}$$

where

$$a_{m,k}=K^{l_0k1}\left(\frac{CB}{CA}\right)^m\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{l_0k1}{m}\right)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{k+m1}{k}\right)\left(\frac{AB}{CA}\right)^k,$$

we come to

Theorem 3. The functions

$$V_\gamma =\widehat{y}^\gamma (x^2F_4(1,2\gamma ,2,1\gamma ,\widehat{x},\widehat{y})+1),$$

where

$$\frac{x^2(BC)}{y^2(CA)}=\widehat{x},K\frac{z^2(AB)}{y^2(CA)}=\widehat{y}$$

are solutions of the system (10), for $`\gamma C.`$

4. More than two degrees of freedom

In the previous section we saw that the integrable perturbations of separable systems with two degrees of freedom led to the hypergeometric functions of two variables. Now, one can expect that in a case of more than two degrees of freedom, the integrable potentials are connected with the hypergeometric functions again, but with more than two variables. We will consider the billiard system inside an ellipsoid in $`R^3`$, and we will see that corresponding potential perturbations are still related to the Appell function $`F_4`$ of two variables, if the ellipsoid is symmetric.

Billiards inside an symmetric ellipsoid in $`R^3`$

Let us consider the billiard system within an ellipsoid in $`R^3`$

$$\frac{x^2}{A}+\frac{y^2}{B}+\frac{z^2}{C}=1.$$

Potential perturbations $`W=W(x,y,z)`$ of such systems in a form of the Laurent polynomials were calculated in . They satisfy the system (4) for $`n=3`$.

$$W_{l_0}=\frac{1}{z^{2l_0}}\underset{0m+n+k<l_0}{}\frac{(l_0k1)!(1)^n}{m!n!(l_01kmn)!}\frac{P_{m,n}^k(\beta ,\gamma )}{\gamma ^{m+k}\beta ^{n+k}}x^{2m}y^{2n}z^{2k},$$
$`11`$
where

$$P_{m,n}^k(\beta ,\gamma )=\underset{i=0}{\overset{k}{}}\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{m+k1i}{ki}\right)\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n+i1}{i}\right)(1)^i\beta ^{ki}\gamma ^i.$$

and $`\beta =BC,\gamma =CA.`$

The symmetric case $`A=B`$ corresponds to the condition $`\gamma +\beta =0.`$

Lemma 1. If $`\gamma +\beta =0`$ then we have

$$P_{m,n}^k(\beta ,\beta )=\left(\genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{k+m+n1}{k}\right)\beta ^k.$$
$`12`$
Proof.

$`P_{m,n}^k(\beta ,\beta )`$ $`=\beta ^k{\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{k}{}}}\left({\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{m+ki1}{ki}}\right)\left({\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{n+i1}{i}}\right)`$
$`=\beta ^k{\displaystyle \underset{i=0}{\overset{k}{}}}\left({\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{ki+m1}{ki}}\right)\left({\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{i+n1}{i}}\right)=\left({\displaystyle \genfrac{}{}{0pt}{}{k+m+n1}{k}}\right)\beta ^k.`$
By putting (12) into (11) we get, using $`\gamma =\beta `$

$`W_{l_0}=C{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\widehat{z}^{l_0}}}{\displaystyle \underset{m+n+k=1}{\overset{l_0}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(l_01)\mathrm{}(l_0mnk)(m+n+k1)!(1)^n}{(l_01)\mathrm{}(l_0k)(m+n1)!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{x}^m}{m!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{y}^n}{n!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{z}^k}{k!}}`$
$`={\displaystyle \frac{C}{(\widehat{z})^{l_0}}}\left[{\displaystyle \underset{m+n+k=1}{\overset{l_0}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(l_0+2)\mathrm{}(l_0+m+n+k)(1)_{m+n+k1}}{(l_0+1)\mathrm{}(l_0+k)(1)^m(1)_{m+n1}}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{x}^m}{m!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{y}^n}{n!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{z}^k}{k!}}+1\right]`$
where $`\widehat{x}=\frac{x^2}{\gamma },\widehat{y}=\frac{y^2}{\beta },\widehat{z}=\frac{z^2}{\gamma }`$.

$`W_{l_0}=C\widehat{z}^{l_0}\left({\displaystyle \underset{m+n+k=1}{\overset{l_0}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{m+n+k1}(2l_0)_{m+n+k1}(1)^m}{(1)_{m+n1}(1l_0)_k}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{x}^m}{m!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{y}^n}{n!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{z}^k}{k!}}+1\right)`$
$`=C\widehat{z}^{l_0}\left({\displaystyle \underset{m+n+k=1}{\overset{l_0}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{m+n+k1}(2l_0)_{m+n+k1}(1)^m(m+n)!}{(2)_{m+n1}(1l_0)_k(m+n1)!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{x}^m}{m!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{y}^n}{n!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{z}^k}{k!}}+1\right)`$
$`=C\widehat{z}^{l_0}\left({\displaystyle \underset{m+n+k=1}{\overset{l_0}{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{m+n+k1}(2l_0)_{m+n+k1}}{(2)_{m+n1}(1l_0)_k}}{\displaystyle \frac{(\widehat{x}+\widehat{y})^{m+n}}{(m+n1)!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{z}^k}{k!}}+1\right)`$
$`=C\widehat{z}^{l_0}\left[(\widehat{x}+\widehat{y}){\displaystyle \underset{0s+k<l_0}{}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1)_{s+k}(2l_0)_{s+k}}{(2)_s(1l_0)_k}}{\displaystyle \frac{(\widehat{x}+\widehat{y})^s}{s!}}{\displaystyle \frac{\widehat{z}^k}{k!}}+1\right],`$
where $`C=(1l_0)\gamma ^{l_0}`$, $`m+n1=s`$.

Theorem 4. Generalizations of the integrable potential perturbations from  in the symmetric case are given by:

$$W_{l_0}=(\widehat{z})^{l_0}\left[(\widehat{x}+\widehat{y})F_4(1,2l_0;2,1l_0;\widehat{x}+\widehat{y},\widehat{z})+1\right],$$

where $`l_0C`$.

The case of general dimension

We consider billiard system in $`R^n`$ within an ellipsoid

$$\frac{x_1^2}{a_1}+\mathrm{}+\frac{x_n^2}{a_n}=1.$$

For $`n3`$ we start from a separable system with $`n`$ integrals $`K_1,\mathrm{},K_n`$ which are mutualy in involution, where $`K_n=H`$ is a Hamiltonian and

$$K_i=\underset{ji}{}\frac{(\dot{x}_ix_j\dot{x}_jx_i)^2}{a_ia_j},i=1,\mathrm{},n1.$$
$`13`$
Then we are interested in potential perturbations $`k_1,\mathrm{},k_n`$, where $`k_i=k_i(x_1,\mathrm{},x_n)`$ depend only on coordinates and $`V=k_n`$. The conditions

$$\{\stackrel{~}{K}_n,\stackrel{~}{K}_i\}=0,i=1,\mathrm{},n1,$$
$`14`$
where

$$\stackrel{~}{K}_i=K_i+k_i,i=1,\mathrm{},n,$$
$`15`$
are equivalent to the system (4). Nontrivial (and maybe unexpected) fact is that new integrals commute between themselves.

Lemma 2 From (13) and (14), it follows that

$$\{\stackrel{~}{K}_j,\stackrel{~}{K}_i\}=0,i,j=1,\mathrm{},n1.$$

This was checked by direct calculation for $`n=3`$ in , but in general case it follows from the generalized Bertrand- Darboux theorem proved in :

Generalized Bertrand-Darboux Theorem  For a natural Hamiltonian system with a Hamiltonian

$$H=\frac{1}{2}\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}p_i^2+V(x)$$

the following three conditions are equivalent:

(a) It has $`n1`$ global, indipendent, involutive integrals of the form (15).

(b) The potential $`V`$ satisfies the system (4).

(c) The Hamilton - Jacobi equation for $`H`$ is separable in generalized elliptic coordinates $`(u_1,\mathrm{},u_n)`$ given by

$$1+\underset{i=1}{\overset{n}{}}\frac{x_i}{za_i}=\frac{_{j=1}^n(zu_j)}{_{k=1}^n(z\alpha _k)}.$$

Theorem 5 Integrable potential perturbations of the billiard systems inside a symetric ellipsoid in $`R^n`$ for arbitrary $`nN`$ are given with

$$V_k^n=(\widehat{x}_n)^k\left[(\widehat{x}_1+\mathrm{}+\widehat{x}_{n1})F_4(1,2k;2,1k;\widehat{x}_1+\mathrm{}+\widehat{x}_{n1},\widehat{x}_n)+1\right]$$

for any $`kC`$.

5. Conclusion

If we denote in (11) $`\beta /\gamma `$ as $`q`$, then, theorem 4 shows that the potentials $`W_{l_0}`$ are certain deformations of the (Appell) hypergeometric functions. The analysis of this deformation and comparison to the known $`q`$-deformations and generaisations of the hypergeometric functions multivariable () remains as an interesting problem.

Potential perturbations of the classical nonholonomic rigid body problems are described in . It looks that they are also connected with the hypergeometric functions.

From geometric point of view, it is well known that the billiard systems within an ellipse are closely related to the Poncelet and the Cayley theorem \[14-16\]. So, the Appell hypergeometric functions define natural deformations of these classical projective geometry settings.

Acknowledgment This research was partialy done during the author’s visit to the Mathematical Department of the Kyoto University as a Matsumae International Foundation Fellow. It is a great pleasure to thank professor M. Jimbo for warm hospitality and A.Yu. Orlov for valuable discussions.

References

 Kozlov V.V.: Some integrable generalizations of the Jacobi problem for the geodesics on the ellipsoid (in Russian), Prikl. Mat. Mekh., Vol. 59, No.1, 3-9, (1995.)

 Whittaker E.T.: A treatise on the analitical dynamics of particles and rigid bodies, thierd edition, Cambridge, the University press (1927)

 Bertrand J., Journ.de Math., Vol. 17, p. 121, (1852)

 Darboux G.: Archives Neerlandaises (2), Vol. 6, p. 371 (1901)

 Dragovic V.: On integrable potentials of billiard within ellipse (in Russian), Prikl. Mat. Mekh., Vol. 62, (1998.), No. 1, 166-169.

 Vilenkin N. Ja. and Klimyk A. U.:Representation of Lie groups and special functions, Recent Advances, Kluwer Academic Rublishers, p. 497 (1995)

 Appell P. and Kampe de Feriet J.: Fonctions hypergeometriques et hyperspheriques. Polynomes d’Hermite, Gauthier Villars, Paris (1926)

 Appell P. Sur les fonctions hypergeometriques de deux variables et sur des equations lineaires aux derivees partielles, Comptes Rendus, v.90, p. 296 (1880)

 Dragovic V.: On integrable perturbations of the Jacobi problem for the geodesics on the ellipsoid, J. of Phys. A, Math. and General, Vol. 29, L317-L321, (1996.)

 Jovanovic B.: Integrable perturbation of billiards on constant curvature surfaces, Phys. Lett. A, Vol. 231, 353-358, (1997.)

 Dragovic V., Jovanovic B.: On integrable potential perturbations of billiard system within ellipsoid, J. of Math. Phys., Vol. 38, (1997.)

 Marshall I., Wojciechowski S.:When is a Hamiltonian system Separable?

 Dragović V., Gajić B., Jovanović B.:Generalizations of classical integrable nonholonomic rigid bodu sustems, J. Phys A: Math. Gen., Vol. 31, 9861-9869 (1998)

 H. Lebesgue Les coniques , Gauthier-Villars, Paris, (1942), 115-149.

 P. Griffiths, J. Harris On Cayley’s explicit solution to Poncelet’s porism, L’Enseignement mathem. 24, (1978), 31-40.

 Dragović V., Radnović M. On periodical trajectories of the billiard systems within an ellipsoid in $`R^d`$ and generalized Cayley’s condition J. of Math. Phys.,Vol. 39, No. 11, (1998)


text:
# The Mass Function of NGC 288

## 1 Introduction

The Galactic globular cluster NGC 288 is located about one degree away from the South Galactic Pole, in a region of negligible interstellar extinction, $`E(BV)=0.04`$ (Alcaino et al. 1997), and very low contamination by field stars. The cluster is at a distance modulus of $`(mM)_V=14.7`$ and is relatively metal-poor with $`[Fe/H]=1.3`$ (Alcaino et al. 1997). Its stellar population is characterized by the presence of blue stragglers and by an anomalous horizontal branch (HB) which is almost entirely composed of stars blue-ward of the instability strip (Alcaino et al. 1997). Such a blue HB may well be induced by the second parameter, although the study of Buonanno et al. (1984) ruled out that the HB anomaly observed in NGC 288 is due to any peculiarity in the cluster’s He content, metallicity or age. Buonanno et al. (1984) estimated an age of $`16\pm 3`$ Gyr from the $`\mathrm{\Delta }m_{(TOHB)}`$ method, whereas Alcaino et al. (1997) have derived $`14\pm 2`$ Gyr from isochrone fitting techniques.

NGC 288 has been observed at infrared wavelengths only by Davidge & Harris (1997), who have acquired 3 min exposures in $`J`$ and 3 min exposures in $`K`$ of a central field and 48 min images both in $`J`$ and $`K`$ of a region at $`140^{}`$ West and South of the cluster core. In this way, Davidge & Harris have resolved the red super-giant branch of the cluster down to the upper main sequence (MS) at $`K<20`$ and $`0<JK<1`$. Their isochrone fitting has been performed with the oxygen-enriched (at $`[Fe/H]=1.26`$) tracks of Bergbusch & Vandenberg (1992) and has resulted into an age in excess of 16 Gyr.

In this paper, we present the first NICMOS observations of a field in the outskirts of NGC 288 taken in the $`J`$ and $`H`$ bands. The data are described in Section 2 and the cluster’s colour-magnitude diagramme (CMD) and mass function (MF) are presented in Section 3. Discussion and conclusions follow in Section 4.

## 2 Observations and data reduction

NGC 288 has been observed with the NIC3 camera of the NICMOS instrument on board the HST during the parallel observations campaign (GO 7811). The observed region is located $`2.4`$ times the cluster’s half-light radius ($`r_{hl}=2\stackrel{}{.}25`$; Djorgovski 1993) away from the centre, or $`1\stackrel{}{.}6`$ E and $`5\stackrel{}{.}1`$ S. Six images of the same field are available, both in the $`J`$ and $`H`$ bands (NIC3 filters F110W and F160W, centered at $`1.1\mu `$m and $`1.6\mu `$m, respectively) for a total exposure time of 45 min in $`J`$ and 47 min in $`H`$. The detailed log of the observations is given in Table 1.

The images have been reduced using the NICMOS standard calibration pipeline: they have been first processed with CALNICA for bias subtraction, dark-count correction and flat-fielding. They have then been associated and combined with CALNICB, to remove cosmic rays and to increase the signal-to-noise ratio. Photometry on the images has been performed with the DAOPHOT package. Stars have been identified with DAOFIND, by setting the detection threshold at $`10\sigma `$ above the background. We have traced the radial profile of each identified object and discarded those which showed a full width at half-maximum (FWHM) larger than $`2\stackrel{}{.}5`$, being the typical FWHM of a point source $`1\stackrel{}{.}5`$ in our frames. This procedure has produced a sample of 75 stars. We have also detected 15 extended objects, whose fundamental parameters (flux, position and shape parameters) have been measured with S-Extractor.

The field not being crowded, stellar count-rates have been measured in fixed apertures of 5 pixel radius (equivalent to 1′′), and the corresponding background values have been determined in a fixed annulus with a radius of 7 pixel and a width of 3 pixel. After background subtraction, stellar count-rates have been corrected for the NIC3 intra-pixel sensitivity, using the equations computed by Storrs et al. (1999, cf. Table 2) in the case of out-of-focus campaign data, and for the camera being out of focus, making use of TinyTim (Krist & Hook, 1999) which simulates the PSF of the NIC3 camera with the precise optics settings corresponding to a specific filter and to a specific observation date. We have used TinyTim to compute two PSFs for each frame, one for our observation date (November 1997) and one for January, 15, 1998 when NIC3 was in-focus (in-focus campaigns were carried out in 1998 January and June). We have calculated the encircled energy for a 5 pixel aperture for each PSF and used the flux ratio in-focus to out-of-focus to correct our measured count-rates. Finally, we have multiplied the sample count-rates by a factor of $`1.075`$ to reconduct them to the values measured in a nominal infinite aperture.

The corrected count-rates ($`c`$) have been converted into the VEGAMAG photometric system by means of the relation:

$$m=2.5log\left(\frac{cU}{Z}\right)$$

where $`U`$ is the count-rate/flux conversion factor (known as inverse sensitivity) and $`Z`$ is the flux of a zero-magnitude star in the VEGAMAG system, provided for all NICMOS filters and VEGAMAG bands by the HST Data Handbook and by the NICMOS Photometry Update (cf. http://www.stsci.edu/instruments/nicmos).

The main source of error in our photometry is due to the intra-pixel sensitivity effect, that causes up to 30% flux variations among individual images. With the correction of Storrs et al. (1999) the spread in photometry is reduced to 0.1 mag in J and 0.09 mag in H. We, therefore, assume an uncertainty of 0.1 mag in both the $`J`$ and $`H`$ bands.

## 3 Results

### 3.1 Photometric completeness

The dereddened ($`E(BV)=0.04`$; Alcaino et al. 1997) $`J`$ and $`H`$ magnitude distributions are shown in Figure 1 for the samples of stars and galaxies identified in the observed NGC 288 field. Stars populate the $`18<J<25`$ and $`18<H<24`$ intervals, while galaxies distribute in the $`17<J<24`$ and $`19<H<24`$ ranges. The fact that stars and galaxies as faint as $`J`$ or $`H24`$ have been detected indicates that the cluster field does not contain objects fainter than the $`24`$th mag and, thence, that our star sample is complete. Completeness is also secured by the very low level of field crowding, which allows full object detection by eye.

### 3.2 The Colour-Magnitude Diagramme

The dereddened CMD of the stars in our sample is plotted in Figure 2. It extends over the $`H`$-band magnitude interval $`1824`$ and the $`0.1<JH<1.4`$ in colour.

We have superposed on the observed distribution the expected $`H`$-band magnitudes and $`JH`$ colours as computed for low mass stars at $`[Fe/H]=1.3`$ by Baraffe et al. 1997 (solid line). The theoretical track is here scaled by the NGC 288 distance modulus $`(mM)_0=14.7`$. The IR colours provided by Baraffe et al. have been computed adopting the most recent non-grey model atmospheres and an improved equation of state for low mass stars. The quite good agreement between the observed and the theoretical distributions (within an observational uncertainty of $`0.2`$ mag in colour) confirms that we have indeed detected the lower end of the MS of NGC 288.

Particularly evident in Figure 2 is the change of slope occurring at at $`H20`$ and $`JH=0.8`$. This is due to the atmospheric opacity being mostly produced by H2 molecules for stellar masses lower than $`0.5`$ M.

### 3.3 The luminosity and mass functions

In spite of the limited number of stars in our sample, we have been able to trace the luminosity function (LF) for the observed cluster field, as shown in Figure 3, where the number of stars observed in each $`0.5`$ mag bin is plotted as a function of the $`H`$-band magnitude. The LF displays the same general features found by Paresce & De Marchi (2000) for a sample of twelve Galactic globular clusters: a peak at $`M_H6.8`$ (corresponding to $`M_I8.2`$) followed by a rapid decrease towards fainter luminosities.

We have used the mass-luminosity relation corresponding to the theoretical track plotted in Figure 2 to convert the LF into the cluster’s MF. Since the observed LF is the product between the MF and the derivative of the mass-luminosity relation, we have first adopted a specific MF, subsequently derived the mass-luminosity of Baraffe et al. and computed their product. The latter has finally been compared with the observed LF of Figure 3 until a good fit was found. As our first attempt, we have assumed a power-law mass function in the form of $`dN/dlog(m)m^x`$ (using this notation, Salpeter’s IMF would have $`x=1.35`$). We have found, however, that no single power-law mass function can fit the LF of the observed NGC 288 field. Indeed, an index $`x=0.1`$ can well reproduce the bright portion of the observed LF at $`M_H<6.8`$, but it overestimates the number of stars fainter than the LF peak (cf. top panel of Figure 4). On the other hand, an index $`x=1.1`$ properly fits the faint section of the LF at $`M_H>6.8`$, but it predicts a number of bright stars a factor of $``$2 larger than observed (cf. bottom panel of Figure 4).

As an alternative to a power-law, Paresce & De Marchi (2000) have shown that a log-normal distribution peaked at $`0.35`$ M gives a good fit to the MF of globular clusters for masses smaller than $`0.8`$ M (i.e. for stars that are still on their MS). Our data show that the LF obtained for MS stars in NGC 288 is fully compatible with a log-normal distribution of the form:

$$ln\left(\frac{dN}{dlog(m)}\right)=A\left[\frac{log(m/m_c)}{\sqrt{2}\sigma }\right]^2$$

where A is a normalization constant, provided that the characteristic mass takes on the value of $`m_c=0.42`$ and the standard deviation is $`\sigma =0.35`$ (see Figure 5).

We note here, as already pointed out by Paresce & De Marchi (2000), that the fact that a log-normal distribution is a viable form for the MF of a cluster for stars with mass $`m<0.8`$ M does not imply that the same functional form is appropriate at higher masses as well, where a power-law distribution seems more appropriate (see Elmegreen 1999).

## 4 Discussion and conclusions

Comparing the best fitting LF of Figure 5 with the results published by Paresce & De Marchi (2000) indicates that the MF of NGC 288 is fully compatible with the global function found by these authors for a sample of twelve Galactic clusters spanning a wide range of metallicity, different distances from the Galactic centre and plane, and structural parameters (core and half-light radius and concentration ratio).

NGC 288 is characterized by a highly elliptical orbit which makes disruption by tidal shocking quite effective and more important than disruption by internal two-body relaxation, according to the calculations of Dinescu et al. (1999). In particular, Gnedin & Ostriker (1997) have derived a disruption time of $`1`$ Gyr for NGC 288, which suggests that this cluster might have experienced a strong interaction with the Galactic tidal field during its lifetime, such that it could be totally dissolved within the next Gyr or so.

Using the log-normal MF determined so far, we have computed the index $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{log}N`$ defined as the logarithmic ratio between the number of stars with mass $`m=m_c=0.42`$ M and the number of stars with $`m=0.7`$ M. Paresce & De Marchi (2000) have defined such a parameter in order to quantitatively describe the shape of the MF and correlate it with the properties of the cluster (see their paper for more details). In Figure 6, we have plotted the value of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{log}N`$ for NGC 288 along with those of the clusters studied by Paresce & De Marchi as a function of their expected time to disruption.

We note here that Paresce & De Marchi have measured $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{log}N`$ on the global MF of the cluster, i.e. the MF after correction of the effects of internal dynamical evolution (mass segregation). The global MF has been shown by De Marchi, Paresce & Pulone (2000) to closely approach the local MF, provided the latter is measured near the cluster’s half-light radius ($`r_{hl}`$). Our data, however, have been taken at $`2.4r_{hl}`$, so that a correction would be required to our value of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{log}N`$ for NGC 288. Unfortunately, we do not have enough data (surface brightness and radial velocity profiles and more than one LF at different radial locations) to investigate the dynamical structure of the cluster and correct for the effects of mass segregation. On the other hand, as shown by De Marchi et al. (2000), at $`2.4r_{hl}`$ the MF is expected to be steeper than the global MF in the mass range of interest here ($`0.40.8`$ M) and, as such, the value of $`\mathrm{\Delta }\mathrm{log}N`$ is to be considered here an upper limit.

Thus, the position of NGC 288 at the opposite corner of NGC 5272 confirms the scattered nature of the distribution in Figure 6, hence the absence of any correlation between dynamical evolution and the MF observed near the clusters half-light radius as pointed out by Paresce & De Marchi. Indeed, compared to the bulk of globular clusters with a mean disruption time $`T_d32`$ Gyr, NGC 288 appears to have suffered the highest degree of erosion from the Galaxy. Yet, its MF is nearly identical to what observed for the cluster sample of Paresce & De Marchi (2000). So, although it has not been determined precisely at the $`r_{hl}`$, it is most likely that the observed MF closely reflect the cluster’s initial mass function (IMF). An example of the opposite case is offered by NGC 6712, a cluster with a dynamical history not to different from that of NGC 288, yet with a very different MF. Its MF, measured by De Marchi et al. (1999) at $`1.7r_{hl}`$ peaks at $`0.75`$ M and slowly drops down to 0.3 M, while the average MF of all the clusters in Figure 6 is always increasing in the mass range $`0.750.3`$ M. The lack of low-mass stars (less massive than 0.75 M) in NGC 6712 has been attributed by De Marchi et al. (1999) and by Takahashi & Portegies Zwart (2000) to the effect of stripping by tidal interactions with the Galactic bulge.

According to Pryor & Meylan (1993), NGC 288 and NGC 6712 have a concentration ratio of $`0.96`$ and $`0.90`$, respectively, so that they have so far experienced a similar degree of internal two-body relaxation. NGC 6712 is twice more massive but a factor of 4 closer to the Galactic centre. The cluster orbits have the same ellipticity ($`0.75`$) but different orbital periods, namely $`230\times 10^6`$ yr and $`130\times 10^6`$ yr for NGC 288 and NGC 6712, respectively. Given an apogalactic distance $`R_a`$ of 11 kpc ($`R_p=1.8`$ kpc) and an observed Galactocentric distance $`R_{GC}=11.1`$ kpc (Dinescu et al. 1999), NGC 288 is now at its apogalactic point. On the contrary, NGC 6712, with $`R_a=6`$ kpc ($`R_p=0.9`$ kpc) and $`R_{GC}=3.5`$ Kpc, is only half-way between its perigalactic and apogalactic points, so that it has crossed the Galactic bulge more recently than NGC 288. Based on the difference in the orbital phase alone, one might speculate that NGC 288 has been able to thermalize its mass distribution after the bulge shock while NGC 6712 is still suffering from it. This hypothesis is, however, not applicable as Gnedin & Ostriker (1997) give a relaxation time at half-light radius of $`1.4`$ Gyr and $`0.7`$ Gry for NGC 288 and NGC 6712, respectively, which is a factor of 5 to 6 larger than the clusters orbital period. Hence, both clusters have still to reach internal relaxation after the last bulge shocking.

Without more data on the LF of these clusters much further out in their periphery, it is not possible to fully understand the differences between their MF. It is, however, plausible that NGC 6712, given its orbital parameters, plunges more deeply than NGC 288 into the bulge so that the low-mass stars depletion observed in its LF is essentially due to stripping by bulge crossing or that the severe modification to its MF has been impressed by encounters with molecular clouds existing in the spiral arms of the Milky Way where this cluster currently sits.

###### Acknowledgements.

We would like to thank Isabelle Baraffe for computing the theoretical tracks at $`[Fe/H]=1.3`$ in the NICMOS $`J`$ and $`H`$ bands and Oleg Gnedin for helpful discussions. We also thank an anonymous referee for valuable comments and suggestions that have considerably strengthened the presentation of this work. MSB acknowledges support from the Osservatorio Astronomico di Cagliari and from the Director General’s Discretionary Fund at ESO.