An XMM-Newton Survey of Field Ellipticals

Recent Chandra and XMMNewton observations show that a large fraction ofearlytype galaxies in groups and clusters retain hot gas halos. However, theproperties of these halos are consistent with the idea that the amount of hotgas has been significantly reduced by environmental effects like rampressurestripping and evaporation. To quantify the importance of such mechanisms, weneed to compare the properties of ellipticals in rich environments to those inthe field where these mechanisms are not expected to be important.Unfortunately, very few field ellipticals have sufficient Xray observations. Wepropose to rectify this situation by observing a sample of 6 nearby fieldellipticals with XMMNewton. truncated!, Please see actual data for full text [truncated!, Please see actual data for full text]