The dark matter haloes of massive, relaxed galaxy clusters observed with Chandra

By R. Schmidt, S. Heidelberg, KIPACStanford. 2006

147 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We use the Chandra X-ray Observatory to study the dark matter halos of 34 massive, dynamically relaxed galaxy clusters, spanning the redshift range 0.06 < z < 0.7. The observed dark matter and total mass (dark-plus-luminous matter) profiles can be approximated by the Navarro Frenk & White (hereafter NFW) model for cold dark matter (CDM) halos; for {approx} 80 percent of the clusters, the NFW model provides a statistically acceptable fit. In contrast, the singular isothermal sphere model can, in almost every case, be completely ruled out. We observe a well-defined mass-concentration relation for the clusters with a normalization and intrinsic scatter in good agreement with the predictions from simulations. The slope of the mass-concentration relation, c {infinity} M{sub vir}{sup a}/(1 + z){sup b} with a = -0.41 {+-} 0.11 at 95 percent confidence, is steeper than the value a {approx} -0.1 predicted by CDM simulations for lower mass halos. With the slope a included as a free fit parameter, the redshift evolution of the concentration parameter, b = 0.54 {+-} 0.47 at 95 percent confidence, is also slower than, but marginally consistent with, the same simulations (b {approx} 1). Fixing a {approx} -0.1 leads to an apparent evolution that is significantly slower, b = 0.20 {+-} 0.45, although the goodness of fit in this case is significantly worse. Using a generalized NFW model, we find the inner dark matter density slope, a, to be consistent with unity at 95 percent confidence for the majority of clusters. Combining the results for all clusters for which the generalized NFW model provides a good description of the data, we measure ? = 0.88 {+-} 0.29 at 95 percent confidence, in agreement with CDM model predictions.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation, Nuclear and High Energy Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/395cdfd912e972a6be7291576096e81c0cd9e759

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Astronomy and Astrophysics

In Instrumentation

In Nuclear and High Energy Physics

Citations in the corpus

THE DENSITY PROFILES OF MASSIVE, RELAXED GALAXY CLUSTERS. II. SEPARATING LUMINOUS AND DARK MATTER IN CLUSTER CORES (2012, result): “It is unclear why the total density profile should then match the shape expected of collisionless CDM.”
Cosmological Parameters from Observations of Galaxy Clusters (2011, methodology): “…of the brightness and temperature data, but assumes that the mass distribution follows a well-motivated parameterized form (e.g. Equation 15; Allen, Ettori & Fabian 2001, Schmidt & Allen 2007); this approach simultaneously provides a framework for testing the validity of various mass models.”
THE CLUSTER LENSING AND SUPERNOVA SURVEY WITH HUBBLE: AN OVERVIEW (2011, background): “9+3332: these two clusters are included in the A08 compilation (as well as in Schmidt & Allen (2007), hereafter SA07, and were classified in these works as dynamically relaxed.”
Improved constraints on dark energy from Chandra X-ray observations of the largest relaxed galaxy clusters (2007, methodology): “The details of the mass analysis and results on the total mass and dark matter profiles are presented by Schmidt & Allen (2007).”
Formation of Galaxy Clusters (2012, background): “…density profiles of clusters and their concentrations (Buote et al. 2007; Ettori et al. 2010; Mandelbaum, Seljak & Hirata 2008; Okabe et al. 2010; Pointecouteau, Arnaud & Pratt 2005;Schmidt & Allen 2007; Sereno & Zitrin 2012; Umetsu et al. 2011a,b; Vikhlinin et al.2006; Wojtak & Łokas 2010).”
Combined strong and weak lensing analysis of 28 clusters from the Sloan Giant Arcs Survey (2011, background): “Also puzzling is the fact that such high concentrations have not been claimed in weak lensing analysis (Okabe et al. 2010) or X-ray analysis (Buote et al. 2007; Ettori et al. 2010) for samples of massive clusters.”
Small scale problems of the $\Lambda$CDM model: a short review (2016, background): “9 [222], but can also agree with the NFW profile [223].”
HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE COMBINED STRONG AND WEAK LENSING ANALYSIS OF THE CLASH SAMPLE: MASS AND MAGNIFICATION MODELS AND SYSTEMATIC UNCERTAINTIES (2014, background): “Although M0429 (z = 0.399) has been subject to various X-ray studies (Schmidt & Allen 2007; Comerford & Natarajan 2007; Maughan et al. 2008; Allen et al. 2008; Mann & Ebeling 2012), we did not find any previous SL, nor WL, analyses for this cluster outside the CLASH framework.”
Impact of baryon physics on dark matter structures: a detailed simulation study of halo density profiles (2010, background): “Observations of X-ray luminous groups and clusters (Buote et al. 2007; Schmidt & Allen 2007) suggest a steeper dependence of concentration on mass than the DM only simulations predict, as was pointed out by Duffy et al. (2008).”
DARK MATTER HALO PROFILES OF MASSIVE CLUSTERS: THEORY VERSUS OBSERVATIONS (2011, background): “As with the Schmidt & Allen (2007) comparison, we find that the simulation results are in good agreement with these observations forM200> 4×1014 h−1M⊙.”
THE DENSITY PROFILES OF MASSIVE, RELAXED GALAXY CLUSTERS. I. THE TOTAL DENSITY OVER THREE DECADES IN RADIUS (2012, methodology): “The tools mentioned so far cannot test for deviations from an NFW profile in the inner halo with much statistical power, even when multiple clusters are stacked (e.g., Schmidt & Allen 2007; Umetsu et al. 2011), except possibly in rare lensing configurations (e.g., Limousin et al. 2007).”
New constraints on dark energy from the observed growth of the most X-ray luminous galaxy clusters (2007, background): “We have verified that including a log-normal scatter in concentration of ∼ 0.15 (e.g. Comerford & Natarajan 2007; Schmidt & Allen 2007) has no effect on our results.”
CLASH-VLT: The mass, velocity-anisotropy, and pseudo-phase-space density profiles of the z = 0.44 galaxy cluster MACS J1206.2-0847 (2013, background): “At present there is some tension between the observedcMr (e.g. Łokas et al. 2006b; Rines & Diaferio 2006; Buote et al. 2007; Schmidt & Allen 2007; Biviano 2008; Ettori et al. 2010; Okabe et al. 2010; Oguri et al. 2012; Newman et al. 2012) and that obtained inΛCDM cosmological simulations (e.g.…”
Dark matter halo concentrations in the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe year 5 cosmology (2008, methodology): “…lensing data are being used to test this hypothesis and generally confirm the anti-correlation between c and M (e.g. Buote et al. 2007; Schmidt & Allen 2007), although the concentrations inferred from strong gravitational lensing may exceed those predicted by the simulations (e.g.…”
ACCURATE UNIVERSAL MODELS FOR THE MASS ACCRETION HISTORIES AND CONCENTRATIONS OF DARK MATTER HALOS (2008, result): “These re- sults are in good agreement with the empirical model proposed by Z03a and favored by the Chandra observation of Schmidt & Allen (2007), but are very different from the predictions of the models proposed by B01, E01 and W02.”
Weighing simulated galaxy clusters using lensing and X-ray (2009, methodology): “…consists of measuring the concentration-mass relation of clusters and of comparing Article published by EDP Sciences Page 1 of 23 it with the theoretical predictions (e.g. Pointecouteau et al. 2005; Vikhlinin et al. 2005; Buote et al. 2007; Schmidt & Allen 2007; Comerford & Natarajan 2007).”