Stars in high surface density galaxies are the most prominent place for baryons. For our purpose it is reasonable to imagine the galaxies contain two distinct stellar populations, an old spheroidal component and a disk component consisting of generally younger stars, with a mix depending on galaxy type. Elliptical galaxies lack a significant disk component, and irregular (Im) galaxies are in the opposite extreme, having small or insignificant bulges. The formation of these two components seems to follow different histories, so it is appropriate to count baryons in stars divided into these two categories. The mass density for each component is obtained as
where is the mean luminosity
density, fB is the
fraction of the luminosity density produced by the spheroid or disk
component,
and <M/LB> is the mass-to-light ratio for each component
including the stars and star remnants.
The suffix B refers to luminosities measured in the B band,
our choice for a standard wavelength band.
Although the stellar population of irregular galaxies is similar to
that of the disk component, we treat the former separately to
emphasize its distinct role in the luminosity density at
low redshift and a slightly smaller mass-to-light ratio
because of its younger mean age.