H I studies of the Sculptor group galaxies. VI - NGC 300

Abstract

A study of the kinematics of the Sculptor group galaxy NGC 300 is presented. VLA observations of the H I line show a dramatically warped H I disk just outside the optical disk. A two-component mass model, fitted to the data, gives a total mass of 2.4X10^10^ M_sun_ at the last observed point of the rotation curve. This value implies a (M/L_B_)_global_ ~11M_sun_/L_sun_ for the galaxy which is compared with the total dynamical (M/L_B_)_dyn_ of the group. This comparison suggests that dark matter is probably more concentrated around the galaxies of the group than uniformly distributed in the intergalactic medium.