Introduction

Although the HI content of elliptical galaxies is generally much lower than that of spirals (e.g. Bregman et al. 1992), some ellipticals do contain detectable amounts of neutral hydrogen. Studying the HI distribution and kinematics in these galaxies is interesting for several reasons -- it provides the most straightforward and reliable tracer of the mass distribution in the outermost regions of elliptical galaxies, and it can also tell us something about their evolutionary history (since in many cases HI, where present, appears to have been accreted from outside the galaxy; Knapp et al. 1985).

© Copyright Astronomical Society of Australia 1997