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Use the stellar position second-moment tensor $I_{ij}=\int \rho x_i{x}_j{d}^{3}x$. This is the $I$ entering the tensor virial theorem, rather than the engineering moment-of-inertia tensor $\mathrm{tr}(I)1-I$. For a density pattern rotating steadily about its third principal axis, choose $t=0$ when its in-plane axes are principal axes. Then $I(0)=\mathrm{diag}(I_1,I_2,I_3)$ andIn particular, $I_{11}=I_1{\cos }^2\Omega t+I_2{\sin }^2\Omega t$, $I_{22}=I_1{\sin }^2\Omega t+I_2{\cos }^2\Omega t$, and $I_{12}=(I_1-I_2)\sin \Omega t\cos \Omega t$, while $I_{33}=I_3$ and $I_{13}=I_{23}=0$. Two differentiations at $t=0$ prove the inertia-tensor acceleration of a steadily rotating stellar pattern:Both the off-diagonal acceleration and the in-plane trace acceleration vanish at this instant.

Write $\mathbf{u}=\overline{\mathbf{v}}$ for the local mean streaming. The stellar kinetic-energy tensor, stellar pressure-energy tensor, and stellar potential-energy tensor have the conventionsFor an isolated self-gravitating system, $\frac{1}{2}{\ddot{I}}_{ij}=2T_{ij}+{\Pi }_{ij}+W_{ij}$. Subtracting its second diagonal component from the first givessoThis quotient requires $I_{11}\ne I_{22}$. In an axisymmetric density distribution it becomes $0/0$: rotating the pattern about its symmetry axis does not change the density, and this equation cannot determine a pattern speed. Stellar streaming need not be rigid rotation with angular frequency $\Omega$.

Next add the first two diagonal virial equations and use the third. Their acceleration terms vanish, soFor $T_{33}=0$, ${\Pi }_{33}=-W_{33}$. With the planar virial trace ${\Pi }_{\perp }={\Pi }_{11}+{\Pi }_{22}$ and $W_{\perp }=W_{11}+W_{22}$, the prescribed mass-weighted quantities satisfy ${\Pi }_{\perp }=2M{\sigma }_0^2$, $2(T_{11}+T_{22})=M{V}_0^2$, and $1-\delta =2{\Pi }_{33}/{\Pi }_{\perp }$. Therefore $W_{33}=-(1-\delta )M{\sigma }_0^2$ and the planar equation becomesEliminating $M{\sigma }_0^2$ givesThe ${\nu }_0$ in the numerator of the PDF's displayed relation is a notation slip: the velocity subsequently defined is $V_0$. The relation follows from the traces, not from replacing a galaxy by a solid rotating body.

For the axisymmetric oblate spheroid, rotational symmetry gives ${\Pi }_{11}={\Pi }_{22}=M{\sigma }_0^2$, ${\Pi }_{33}=M{\sigma }_0^2(1-\delta )$ and zero integrated off-diagonal random stresses. A line-of-sight unit vector can be chosen as $\mathbf{n}=(\sin i,0,\cos i)$, with $i=0$ face-on. Contracting the random stress tensor with this vector gives the inclination projection of an axisymmetric stellar velocity tensor:This is a mass-weighted random velocity dispersion after subtracting streaming, with consistent aperture weights. Along the projected major axis, azimuthal streaming lies along the direction whose line-of-sight projection is $\sin i$; a rotation amplitude $V_0$ consequently projects asThere is a necessary observational convention here. The globally defined $V_0^2=2(T_{11}+T_{22})/M$ is a streaming mean square. The displayed amplitude relation holds if the rotation curve is constant, or if the measured rotation-amplitude statistic is weighted consistently to represent this intrinsic quantity. Axisymmetry alone does not equate an arbitrary observed peak rotation to the global $V_0$. If $V_r$ instead means the full-aperture line-of-sight streaming root-mean-square, azimuthal averaging yieldsand the corresponding root-mean-square is $V_0\sin i/\sqrt{2}$. Keeping amplitude and root-mean-square distinct prevents a spurious factor of two in the kinetic energy.

Finally, let the intrinsic equatorial and polar semiaxes be $a$ and $c$, and put $q_t=c/a=1-{ϵ}_t$. An intrinsic boundary has $(x^2+y^2)/a^2+z^2/c^2=1$. Its sky minor-axis coordinate is $Y=y\cos i-z\sin i$. Eliminating the line-of-sight coordinate, or maximizing $Y$ on this ellipse, gives the projected minor semiaxis $\sqrt{a^2{\cos }^{2}i+c^2{\sin }^{2}i}$; the major semiaxis remains $a$. Thus the projected axis ratio of an oblate spheroid isSubtracting from unity provesThe face-on limit is round with zero projected rotation amplitude; the edge-on limit reveals the intrinsic flattening and in-plane random velocity dispersion. These limits check both the geometry and the convention for inclination.

Choose intrinsic Cartesian coordinates in which the oblate spheroid isLet $\ell$ be distance along the line of sight and let $y$ be the sky coordinate in the plane containing the line of sight and the symmetry axis. A rotation through the inclination $i$ givesSubstitution into the ellipsoid equation and minimization over $\ell$, equivalently requiring the quadratic in $\ell$ to have zero discriminant on the projected boundary, givesTherefore the projected axis ratio of an oblate spheroid isIt correctly gives $Q=1$ face-on and $Q=q$ edge-on.

Yes. Even under random orientation, a population concentrated at one nonzero intrinsic ratio $q_0$ haswhich decreases from an integrable divergence at the lowest allowed value $Q=q_0$. It is therefore skewed toward the lower end of its support. More generally, a sufficiently narrow intrinsic distribution can retain such low-$Q$ peaks after the mixture in part d.

If the random-orientation assumption is relaxed, preferentially edge-on selection makes $\cos i$ concentrate near zero and hence makes $Q$ concentrate near $q$. Dust extinction, surface-brightness selection, or alignment by environment can instead bias the sample in either direction. Triaxial or prolate galaxy shapes also invalidate the projected axis ratio of an oblate spheroid formula and can produce other low-$Q$ distributions.