Galaxy Populations and Evolution in Clusters IV Deep H 1 Observations of Dwarf Elliptical Galaxies in the Virgo Cluster
In this paper we present deep Arecibo H I and WIYN optical observations of Virgo Cluster dwarf elliptical galaxies. Based on this data we argue that a significant fraction of low-mass galaxies in the Virgo Cluster recently underwent evolution. Our new observations consist of H I 21 cm line observations for 22 classified dE galaxies with optical radial velocities consistent with membership in the Virgo Cluster. Cluster members VCC 390 and VCC 1713 are detected with H 1 masses M H1= 6 x 10 sup 7 and 8 x 10 sup 7 M , respectively, while MH I values in the remaining 20 dE galaxies have upper limits as low as about 5 x 1O sup 5 M. We combine our results with those for 26 other Virgo Cluster dE galaxies with H 1 observations in the literature, seven of which have H I detection claims.