Isolated compact groups of galaxies in the 2dF galaxy redshift survey

An algorithm that finds isolated compact groups of galaxies in redshift catalogs is presented. It works by sorting the neighbors of each galaxy by projected distance, and forming groups according to chosen parameters of compactness and isolation. This work presents the results for an application of the algorithm to the 2dF Catalog. It has been found that a suitable choice of parameters can yield similar number of groups than those found by the Friends of Friends algorithm. It is important to stress, however, that there are also important differences, whose discussion could be useful to gain insight on the nature of galaxy groups, and to complement the results of other studies. Aside from obtaining samples of truly compact and isolated groups for later studies of galaxy properties, it is also possible to extract properties of galaxy groups themselves. As an example, the population of groups in the local Universe has been studied. It has been found that for plausible parameters, the percentage of galaxy pairs accounts for less than 40% of the total number of groups.