1. Mrk 14: This galaxy has been classified as likely to be an S0 by Huchra ([1977]), while it forms a part of the sample of distant irregulars in a study conducted by Hunter & Gallagher ([1986]). The contours in the outer regions look disturbed. See Figs. 1a and 2a. The ellipticity profiles show a complex structure. Ellipticity is highest ( $\approx$ 0.3) in the central region in all the filters. It drops to a value of 0.1 at 9 $^{\prime\prime}$ . Beyond 9 $^{\prime\prime}$ the ellipticity rises again, showing a number of peaks before reaching a value of 0.2 in the outermost region. The isophotes show a continuous twist (40 $^\circ$ ) from the central to the outer regions. The contours in the inner 8 $^{\prime\prime}$ show a boxy nature while beyond 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ they become pointy as is seen from the negative and the positive values respectively of the coefficient B4 of the cos(4 $\phi$ ) term depicted in Fig. 4. Keel & van Soest ([1992]) find no candidate companions near this galaxy. The only significant feature in the colour maps is the blue nucleus (Fig. 1a). The (B-I) colour map does not show any features like dust lanes which can be responsible for the strong isophotal twist. The variation of the colour indices, (V-I), (B-R) and (B-V) with distance from the center are shown in Fig. 3. On the whole, the colours get redder outwards. A sharp change is seen in the inner 8 $^{\prime\prime}$ . (B-V) changes steeply from 0.15 to 0.75 in this region. Beyond this, the change is more gradual. The residual image constructed with the model light distribution subtracted from the direct image fails to reveal any other structure besides a bright nuclear region. A strong isophotal twist and boxiness of the isophotes are indicative of possible interaction in the past. Similar inferences have been drawn by Nieto & Bender ([1989]) and Bender & Möllenhoff ([1987]) for other early-type galaxies. This is the most likely cause for triggering the central starburst in Mrk 14. Besides interactions in the past, an alternative scenario has been suggested by the referee which is also capable of explaining the observed features like the peak in ellipticity, the isophotal twisting and boxiness. He suggests that the above features could also arise from a triaxial bulge remnant of a bar destroyed by the gas accumulation in the nucleus. For such a scenario, the colour gradients can be explained by the star formation that occurred during the gas inflow, the twisting of isophotes could be due to the triaxial bulge and the boxiness as well as the ellipticity peak could be a signature of the now disappeared bar. Hence, the observed features in Mrk 14 could be expected to arise either as a result of a past interaction or the formation of a triaxial bulge from a bar due to mass inflow towards the center.

2. Mrk 87: This is an example of a ringed galaxy. It shows a bright nucleus and a bar surrounded by an inner ring. The nucleus, the bar and the inner ring appear prominently in the B band image. Towards longer wavelengths, the light distribution becomes smoother (Fig. 1b). A companion is situated to the NE of Mrk 87. The central regions seem to be disturbed due to the presence of dust as indicated by the filter dependent behaviour of the ellipticity and the position angle in the inner 5 $^{\prime\prime}$ in Fig. 2b. Beyond 5 $^{\prime\prime}$ , the behaviour is similar in all filters. The ellipticity profiles show a slight discontinuity at 8 $^{\prime\prime}$ . Between 5 $^{\prime\prime}$ and 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ , the position angle in nearly constant at 75 $^\circ$ and then slowly changes by 15 $^\circ$ before reaching the final value of 60 $^\circ$ .The presence of the blue ring is also clearly seen in Fig. 3 at 24 $^{\prime\prime}$ . Rings of stars and gas are often seen in barred spiral galaxies. They are believed to be formed by gas accumulation at the bar's Lindblad resonances. They are blue in colour and are the sites of enhanced star formation (Buta [1986]). Arsenault ([1989]) has shown that the bar and ring features occur with a higher frequency in starburst galaxies as compared to normal galaxies.

3. Mrk 213: This is a barred spiral galaxy. A faint arm is seen emerging from the south-eastern end and curving around towards the north-western side where it is attached to an almost stellar condensation. The contour plots (Fig. 1c) clearly show that the contours in the inner regions have a position angle different from that of the outer region. The contours in the central region appear elliptical. A very bright, saturated star is present at 58 $^{\prime\prime}$ from the center of the galaxy. This star was first masked out before starting the ellipse fitting procedure. The ellipticity profiles show a peak at 4 $^{\prime\prime}$ . Beyond this, the ellipticity falls and then rises again to the disk ellipticity of about 0.5. The position angle curves show a nearly constant value in the inner 8 $^{\prime\prime}$ . We attribute these features to the presence of a nuclear bar in the central region. Such nuclear bars have been detected by Jungwiert et al. ([1997]) and references therein and Wozniak et al. ([1995]) in a number of disk galaxies. These bars are believed to be an efficient mechanism for driving gas into the nuclear region and fueling the starburst. The position angle changes by 25 $^\circ$ between 8 $^{\prime\prime}$ and 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ (Fig. 2c). A dust lane starts from the nucleus, curves around it before proceeding towards the NW direction. The residual maps also show the signature of the bar in the form of a linear structure in the central region (see Fig. 1c).

4. Mrk 363: This peculiar Sc type galaxy has been classified by Geller & Huchra ([1983]) as belonging to a group made up of seven galaxies, based on their proximity in space and their radial velocities. A neutral hydrogen mapping by van Moorsel ([1988]) shows a central concentration of HI. Radio emission extended over the galaxy has been observed by Wrobel & Heeschen ([1988]). An inspection of the contours in the B and the I band (Fig. 1d) reveals that the morphologies are quite different in the two spectral windows. The blue continuum has an extended structure in the central region with no well defined nucleus while the I band image shows a well defined nucleus in the central region. The contours appear highly disturbed and asymmetric in both the bands, though they are more so in the B band. The contours in the B band are stretched out in the north more than those in the I band suggesting the presence of dust in the region at $\approx$ 9 $^{\prime\prime}$ from the nuclear region. The (B-I) map clearly shows a highly reddened region coinciding with this feature. This region has a mean (B-V) of 0.7 while the nuclear region has a mean value of 0.3. The I band image shows a pointed structure starting from the nuclear region and extending up to 4 $^{\prime\prime}$ along the SE direction. There is another pointy structure starting at 6 $^{\prime\prime}$ and extending up to 12 $^{\prime\prime}$ along the southern direction. The ellipticity in the central and the outer regions is 0.2 as is seen from Fig. 2d. Close to the nucleus, the ellipticity profile shows a small kink. It rises to a value of 0.4 at 9.5 $^{\prime\prime}$ - the region where the contours start becoming pointy again. Subtracting the smoothed image from the direct images revealed complex fine structure. A bright and stellar nucleus, with spiral arms lying along the north-south direction and extending right into it are seen in Fig. 1d. As this galaxy belongs to a group of seven galaxies, tidal interactions with the other galaxies of the group are a likely cause of the enhancement in star formation activity in this galaxy.

5. Mrk 449: This is the most inclined galaxy in our sample. We derive an inclination of 75 $^\circ$ for this galaxy. The contour maps show the presence of a highly reddened region lying to the east of the central nucleus. This feature gets weaker towards longer wavelengths. Correspondingly, the colour map also shows a reddened vertical band in this region (refer Fig. 1e). We interpret this as a dust lane. This dust lane lies neither along the major axis of the galaxy, nor along its minor axis, but is at an intermediate angle. Hawarden et al. ([1981]) observed such "skew" dust lanes in a small fraction of early type galaxies. They suggest that the properties of the galaxies with such "skew" dust lanes are best attributed to the accretion of cool material at a fairly recent epoch. The signature of this is also seen in the surface brightness profiles as a dip at 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ most prominent in B and weakest in I (Fig. 2e), and as a reddened region in the colour plots in Fig. 3. A cut across the dust lane taken at a position angle 97 $^\circ$ is presented in Fig. 5, which clearly shows the extent and the reddening due to the dust lane in (B-R). (B-R) changes from 0.8 in the nuclear region to 1.5 at the location of the dust lane. The position angle remains constant throughout except for a small dip in the central region. The very high inclination of this system makes it difficult to interpret the results of the ellipse fitting uniquely. The residual image shows complex fine structure. Excess of luminosity is present in the nucleus as well as in the region to the east of the dust lane.

6. Mrk 743: is classified as a peculiar E0 galaxy in the Markarian catalog. It forms a part of the sample of galaxies with double nuclei studied by Mazzarella & Boroson ([1993]). An inspection of the contour plots in the four bands reveals the presence of two nuclei surrounded by a common envelope. The envelope is asymmetric in the outer regions. Both the nuclei have comparable fluxes in the V band. As we go towards longer wavelengths, the western nucleus starts getting brighter, while the eastern component becomes dominant at shorter wavelengths (Fig. 1f). Mrk 743 is one of the few HI sources among early type galaxies in which the HI distribution shows a central concentration, rather than the usual depression (Burstein et al. [1987]). The HI distribution is in the form of a disk nearly as large as the galaxian diameter (van Driel & van Woerden [1991]). Wrobel & Heeschen ([1991]) detect unresolved radio emission at 6cm from this object. We fitted ellipses to this galaxy keeping the center coordinates fixed at a point between the two nuclei. This was maintained for all the filter bands. Ellipses were fit only in the common envelope region. The surface brightness profile is shown in Fig. 6. The colour plots in Fig. 3 show a sharp change in the inner 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ . Since Mrk 743 shows such a peculiar morphology, one cannot comment on the nature of the underlying galaxy from the results of the ellipse fitting process. However, the presence of two nuclei with star formation enhanced in only one and the presence of an asymmetric outer envelope all indicate that this is a merger in progress.

$\begin{figure} \resizebox {8.8cm}{!}{\includegraphics{ds7815f5.ps}}\end{figure}$

Figure 5: Variation in (B-R) along a cut through the nucleus and the dust lane in Mrk 449 at a position angle of 97 $^\circ$

$\begin{figure} \resizebox {8.8cm}{!}{\includegraphics{ds7815f6.ps}}\end{figure}$

Figure 6: Surface brightness distribution of Mrk 743 in B (filled squares), V (filled hexagons), R (crosses) and I (triangles)

$\begin{figure} \resizebox {8.8cm}{!}{\includegraphics{ds7815f7.eps}}\end{figure}$

Figure 7: The B4 coefficient as a function of the semi-major axis for Mrk 1002

7. Mrk 781: This is is a barred galaxy with a flocculent spiral structure. No conspicuous difference is seen in the structure between the B and I wave bands in Fig. 1g. We detect a blue ring surrounding the nuclear region in the colour images. Besides the ring and the blue spiral arms, the rest of the galaxy has (B-V) between 0.8-0.9. The extent of the bar is estimated from the peak in the ellipticity profiles in Fig. 2g to be 30 $^{\prime\prime}$ . However, there is a systematic shift in the peak ellipticity from B to I with the peak in B having the largest ellipticity. This is due to the star forming regions at the end of the bar which contribute at shorter wavelengths. Resonances created by the bar are possibly responsible for the star forming ring in the central region. The diameter of the ring is found to be 3 $^{\prime\prime}$ . Faint signatures of the ring are also seen in the ellipticity and the colour profiles. However, since the seeing was $\sim$ 1.5 $^{\prime\prime}$ , imaging at a higher resolution is required to study the details of the ring.

8. Mrk 1002: This galaxy is classified as S0 by Mazzarella & Balzano ([1986]) and as E1 by the Markarian catalog. The central contours, as seen in Fig. 1h, appear elliptical. An inspection of the direct images reveals that at about 6 $^{\prime\prime}$ , the contours start deviating from ellipses and seem to give a faint indication of spiral arms. Beyond 12 $^{\prime\prime}$ , they regain their elliptical nature. The position angle jumps abruptly between 3 $^{\prime\prime}$ and 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ . This is accompanied by a sudden sharp increase in ellipticity from less than 0.1 in the central region to 0.3 at 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ (Fig. 2h). This jump can be attributed to the spiral arm like features. Between 5 $^{\prime\prime}$ and 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ there is a twisting of isophotes, accompanied by boxiness of the isophotes in this region, as seen from the negative values of the B4 coefficient in Fig. 7. We detect a S-shaped blue structure crossing the nucleus in the color maps. The residual maps also show this structure partly. The excess luminosity in this structure shows a one-to-one correspondence with the blue areas in the colour map. The colour maps and the structural features imply star formation in certain regions of this galaxy. Pogge & Eskridge ([1993]) have reported H $\alpha$ emission in the nuclear as well as clumps of emission in the circumnuclear region in this galaxy. The rudimentary spiral pattern, the isophotal twists and the boxiness all suggest that this is a possible case of a merger wherein a gaseous disk was captured by this galaxy at some point. A similar spiral feature is found in the early type galaxy of the interacting pair AM 0327-285 by de Mello et al. ([1995]) which they explain as arising due to the capture of a gaseous disk by the early type galaxy. However, because of the complex nature of the structure, a definitive answer can only be given with additional kinematical information on this galaxy.

9. Mrk 1308: This is a small nearby galaxy of S0 type extending about half an arcminute. It has a small linear companion located at 30 $^{\prime\prime}$ towards the west, which has been confirmed to be a physical neighbour by 6 m telescope spectroscopy (Doublier et al. [1997]). The contours in the B and I filter bands appear smooth (see Fig. 1j). However, we detect a very strong systematic twisting of isophotes in this galaxy (Fig. 2h). Though the ellipticity shows a small variation of less than 0.1 beyond the inner 3 $^{\prime\prime}$ there is a continuous variation in the position angle. Within the inner 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ , the position angle changes by nearly 180 $^\circ$ . Mrk 1308 exhibits strong isophotal twisting overall and non-concentric isophotes in the outer regions. The B4 coefficient oscillates around zero and shows no clear trends. Besides the blue nuclear region, there are no other features detectable in the colour maps. The (B-V) colour for Mrk 1308 is 0.05 in the central regions and gets redder outwards, reaching a value of 0.7 near the periphery. The companion is a red object having a mean (B-V) of 0.9. The star formation activity is confined to the nuclear region. Radio imaging at 6 cm. (Neff & Hutchings [1992]) shows that the emission is in the form of a ring-like structure of diameter $\approx$ 3 $^{\prime\prime}$ . The residual image obtained after subtracting a smoothed image constructed using the isophotal analysis, reveals a bright nucleus and another blob to its north. The tidal interactions induced by the close companion could be responsible for the non-axisymmetric perturbations seen in the central part of Mrk 1308. The gas inflow to the nucleus and hence the star formation in the nucleus could arise as a result of these perturbations. These interactions seem to be the source of the starburst phenomenon in this galaxy.

10. Mrk 1379: is a VV object (Vorontsov-Velyaminov [1977]), with nests of interacting objects. The irregular galaxy lying toward the eastern edge of Mrk 1379 was first masked out to prevent the results of ellipse fitting to be influenced by its luminosity. The position angle increases from 60 $^\circ$ to 75 $^\circ$ between 5 $^{\prime\prime}$ and 8 $^{\prime\prime}$ accompanied by a kink in the ellipticity profile between these points. We detect two peaks in the ellipticity profiles, the ellipticities of which are wavelength dependent. The first one corresponds to the blue structure lying at 13 $^{\prime\prime}$ to the west of the nucleus. Also, the local minima at 19 $^{\prime\prime}$ between the two maxima becomes more prominent at longer wavelengths. There is no appreciable variation in the position angle in these two regions. However, the surface brightness profiles have a small kink at this position in all the filters, the most prominent being in the B band. In the inner 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ the blue isophotes are rounder. Between 10 $^{\prime\prime}$ and 15 $^{\prime\prime}$ the ellipticity profiles do not show any wavelength dependence. Beyond 15 $^{\prime\prime}$ the trend reverses and the I band profiles are rounder. Beyond 30 $^{\prime\prime}$ the contribution to the blue light is predominantly from the spiral arms while the light distribution at longer wavelengths is smoother and in the form of a common envelope, which accounts for the wavelength dependent behaviour of the ellipticity profiles in this region. The (B-I) image shows nuclear as well as extra nuclear star formation. Knots of star formation are seen in the nuclear region as well as along the western periphery of the galaxy at the point where the spiral arms start. In addition to this, global star formation is detected in both the companions lying to the east.

$\begin{figure} \includegraphics []{ds7815f8a-f.eps}\end{figure}$

Figure 8: a,b,c,d,e,f) Exponential fit to the R bandpass luminosity profiles

5 Notes on individual galaxies