The Coma Cluster of Galaxies

General remarks, The following study is a part of a long series of investigations which the author has carried out with the 18-inch and the 48-inch schmidt telescopes to analyze the geometrical distribution of the member galaxies in large regular and irregular clusters of galaxies. The strict definition of a galaxy as a physical object presents considerable difficulties. The whole of the astronomical literature has actually never produced such a definition. This neglect has resulted in some widely held erroneous views on the luminosity function of galaxies. The principal problem originates in the uncertainty regarding the objects which should be counted as separate entities. There is, for instance, the question of whether Messier 31 and its two companions should be counted as one system or as three. This uncertainty is greatly enhanced through the recent discovery by the author of the existence of intergalactic matter. Vast and often very irregular swarms of stars and other matter exist in the spaces between the conventional spiral, elliptical, and irregular galaxies. It is not at all clear how such swarms should be incorporated into any distribution function of galaxies. All of these questions must be cleared up in a comprehensive theory of the luminosity function of galaxies. In the present analysis we shall largely disregard the problems just mentioned. We shall simply count galaxies more or less naively, as has been done in the past. This procedure is quite sufficient to demonstrate that most of the counts of galaxies made with the large reflectors are subject to grave doubts. In particular the luminosity function of galaxies as derived from these counts is erroneous. For instance, the luminosity function given by Hubble1 has a sharp maximum at the absolute photographic magnitude Mp£=£ 14.2. The present writer has shown pre-