Minkowski Functionals of Abell/ACO Clusters

We determine the Minkowski functionals for a sample of Abell/ACO clusters, 401 with measured and 16 with estimated redshifts. The four Minkowski functionals (including the void probability function and the mean genus) deliver a global description of the spatial distribution of clusters on scales from $10$ to 60\hMpc with a clear geometric interpretation. Comparisons with mock catalogues of N--body simulations using different variants of the CDM model demonstrate the discriminative power of the description. The standard CDM model and the model with tilted perturbation spectrum cannot generate the Minkowski functionals of the cluster data, while a model with a cosmological constant and a model with breaking of the scale invariance of perturbations (BSI) yield compatible results.Comment: 10 pages, 13 Postscript figures, uses epsf.sty and mn.sty (included), submitted to MNRA