A close look at secular evolution: Boxy/peanut bulges reduce gas inflow
  to the central kiloparsec
  In this letter we investigate the effect of boxy/peanut (b/p) bulges on
bar-induced gas inflow to the central kiloparsec, which plays a crucial role on
the evolution of disc galaxies. We carry out hydrodynamic gas response
simulations in realistic barred galaxy potentials, including or not the
geometry of a b/p bulge, to investigate the amount of gas inflow induced in the
different models. We find that b/p bulges can reduce the gas inflow rate to the
central kiloparsec by more than an order of magnitude, which leads to a
reduction in the amount of gas available in the central regions. We also
investigate the effect of the dark matter halo concentration on these results,
and find that for maximal discs, the effect of b/p bulges on gas inflow remains
significant. The reduced amount of gas reaching the central regions due to the
presence of b/p bulges could have significant repercussions on the formation of
discy- (pseudo-) bulges, on the amount of nuclear star formation and feedback,
on the fuel reservoir for AGN activity, and on the overall secular evolution of
galaxies.
