Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-short-options-paper-shared-by-prelims-and-parts-a-and-b-of-the-physics-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2012/s26/3/4/solution

Use a Tully-Fisher relation . A simple justification assumes comparable mean surface brightness, so , and comparable total mass-to-light ratio, so . The virial scaling then gives . Calibrating to the previous galaxy yields
This is a rough luminosity estimate: the empirical slope depends on passband and population, and the assumed constant surface brightness and mass-to-light ratio are approximations rather than exact properties of every spiral galaxy.

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