Molecular Hydrogen and Paschen-alpha Emission in Cooling Flow Galaxies

We present near-infrared spectra obtained to search for Paα and molecular hydrogen lines in edge-darkened (FR I-type) radio galaxies with bright Hα emission in the redshift range 0.0535 < z < 0.15. We find that all three galaxies in our sample (PKS 0745-191, PKS 1346+26, & PKS2322-12) which are associated with strong cooling flows also have strong Paα and H2 1–0 S(1) through S(5) emission, while other radio galaxies do not. Together with earlier observations this confirms claims that cooling flow galaxies are copious emitters of molecular hydrogen with large H2 1–0 S(3)/Paα ratios in the range 0.5 to 2. The emission is centrally concentrated within the inner few kiloparsec and could come from warm (T≃1000-1500 K) molecular material which is being deposited by the cooling flow. We speculate that the H2 emission could be related to the interaction between the jets and this molecular gas. Subject headings: galaxies: clusters: general – cooling flows – galaxies: ISM – galaxies: jets – galaxies: ISM – galaxies: elliptical and lenticular, cD Current Address: Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie, Auf dem Hügel 69, D-53121 Bonn, Germany Adjunct Astronomer, Space Telescope Science Institute