The HII regions in M51: Radio and optical observations

摘要

High resoluton, dual frequency radio observations and calibrated H alpha surface photometry of the spiral galaxy M51 are used to determine the physical properties of the 40 brightest HII region complexes. M51 appears to have a normal HII region population when compared with other nearby Sc galaxies for which good data exist. The radio and H alpha data were used to measure the extinction toward the HII regions. The extinction is very patchy but appears to have a weak trend to become on the average smaller toward large galactocentric radii. This trend is consistent with a possible metallicity gradient in M51. The radio determined extinctions were compared with Balmer decrement extinctions and good agreement was found between the two, contrary to previous studies of M51 and other galaxies.