Near-infrared surface photometry and morphology in Virgo cluster spiral galaxy nuclear regions

This paper was published in the April 1995 Astronomical Journal as: Rauscher, B. J. 1995, "Near Infrared Surface Photometry and Morphology in Virgo Cluster Spiral Galaxy Nuclear Regions." The journal article contains color plates. The reader is strongly encouraged to read the journal article.; This paper presents very high spatial resolution (seeing 0.75 arcsec FWHM) K band surface photometry of 15 Virgo cluster spiral galaxy nuclear regions (radii {dollar}<{dollar} 1 Kpc). It presents B and I band CCD images of 13 of these galaxies.; The goals of the study were: (1) to begin to establish a K band baseline of normal spiral galaxy nuclear regions against which peculiar galaxies may be compared, (2) to provide better constraints on N-body models, and (3) to complement near infrared studies of large scale structure in spiral galaxies with very high resolution imaging of the important nuclear regions.; The principal findings are: (1) between 1/4 and 1/3 of these nuclear regions show K band evidence of triaxiality, (2) approximately 1/2 of these galaxies have axisymmetric nuclear regions, and (3) NGC 4321 has a bar that is not detectable in the optical images.