Where's the gas?

Abstract

The recent finding of hot interstellar hydrogen gas in elliptical galaxies is discussed. The belief held until recently that elliptics had no such gas and thus were past their star-forming stage is contradicted by new evidence obtained primarily with the X-ray images from the Einstein satellite. The hot gas is present in far greater amounts than could be accounted for by an outflowing galactic wind. The gas exists in isolated elliptics as well as in cluster members and thus is not part of the intracluster medium. It is concluded that the gas must be forming new small stars, since few massive hot stars are visible in elliptical galaxies.