6 Conclusions

The main results found in this work can be summarized as follows:

1.

The brightness profiles for most objects of our sample are well fitted by the de Vaucouleurs law.

2.

The infrared effective radii of the galaxies of our sample are typically one half of its corresponding radius in B band; this can be interpreted in the sense that the stellar population dominating the near-infrared emission is more concentrated that the bluer population.

3.

The color gradients found are very small, and show a general trend toward bluer colors in the external region.

4.

The infrared colors of the sample are compatible with stellar populations such as those found in metal-rich Galactic clusters. The galaxies NGC 7192, NGC 7562 and NGC 7619 are compatible with less metal-rich populations.

5.

The infrared effective radius ($R_{\rm e}$) and the effective brightness ( $\mu_{\rm e}$) of the sample galaxies confirm the Fundamental Plane relation of elliptical galaxies; the rms scatter of the FP is 0.20 dex for J and H, and 0.23 dex for $K_{\rm s}$. The a values (slope in $\log{\sigma}$) are compatible with the general values found in the literature, while b (slope in $\mu_{\rm e}$) is higher by about 20%.

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge CNPq and PRONEX/FINEP 76.97.1003.00 for financial support.