Summary of the 13th IACHEC Meeting

We summarize the outcome of the 13th meeting of the International Astronomical Consortium for High Energy Calibration (IACHEC), held at Tenuta dei Ciclamini (Avigliano Umbro, Italy) in April 2018. Fifty-one scientists directly involved in the calibration of operational and future high-energy missions gathered during 3.5 days to discuss the current status of the X-ray payload inter-calibration and possible approaches to improve it. This summary consists of reports from the various working groups with topics ranging from the identification and characterization of standard calibration sources, multi-observatory cross-calibration campaigns, appropriate and new statistical techniques, calibration of instruments and characterization of background, and communication and preservation of knowledge and results for the benefit of the astronomical community.Comment: 12 page

The cluster M-T relation from temperature profiles observed with ASCA and ROSAT

We calibrate the galaxy cluster mass - temperature relation using the temperature profiles of intracluster gas observed with ASCA (for hot clusters) and ROSAT (for cool groups). Our sample consists of apparently relaxed clusters for which the total masses are derived assuming hydrostatic equilibrium. The sample provides data on cluster X-ray emission-weighted cooling flow-corrected temperatures and total masses up to r_1000. The resulting M-T scaling in the 1-10 keV temperature range is M_1000 = (1.23 +- 0.20)/h_50 10^15 Msun (T/10 keV)^{1.79 +- 0.14} with 90% confidence errors, or significantly (99.99% confidence) steeper than the self-similar relation M propto T^{3/2}. For any given temperature, our measured mass values are significantly smaller compared to the simulation results of Evrard et al. (1996) that are frequently used for mass-temperature scaling. The higher-temperature subsample (kT > 4 keV) is consistent with M propto T^{3/2}, allowing the possibility that the self-similar scaling breaks down at low temperatures, perhaps due to heating by supernovae that is more important for low-temperature groups and galaxies as suggested by earlier works.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, accepted by Ap

Static Pressure of Hot Gas: Its Effect on the Gas Disks of Galaxies

The static pressure of the hot gas that fills clusters and groups of galaxies can affect significantly the volume density and thickness of the gas disks in galaxies. In combination with the dynamic pressure, the static pressure allows several observed peculiarities of spiral galaxies surrounded by a hot medium to be explained.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figures. This is a slightly modified version of the paper published in Astronomy Letters 2008, Vol. 34, No 11, p. 73

Galaxy Clusters in the Swift/BAT era II: 10 more Clusters detected above 15 keV

We report on the discovery of 10 additional galaxy clusters detected in the ongoing Swift/BAT all-sky survey. Among the newly BAT-discovered clusters there are: Bullet, Abell 85, Norma, and PKS 0745-19. Norma is the only cluster, among those presented here, which is resolved by BAT. For all the clusters we perform a detailed spectral analysis using XMM-Newton and Swift/BAT data to investigate the presence of a hard (non-thermal) X-ray excess. We find that in most cases the clusters' emission in the 0.3-200keV band can be explained by a multi-temperature thermal model confirming our previous results. For two clusters (Bullet and Abell 3667) we find evidence for the presence of a hard X-ray excess. In the case of the Bullet cluster, our analysis confirms the presence of a non-thermal, power-law like, component with a 20-100 keV flux of 3.4 \times 10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 as detected in previous studies. For Abell 3667 the excess emission can be successfully modeled as a hot component (kT=~13keV). We thus conclude that the hard X-ray emission from galaxy clusters (except the Bullet) has most likely thermal origin.Comment: Accepted for publication by Ap

An analysis of electron distributions in galaxy clusters by means of the flux ratio of iron lines FeXXV and XXVI

The interpretation of hard X-ray emission from galaxy clusters is still ambiguous and different models proposed can be probed using various observational methods. Here we explore a new method based on Fe line observations. Spectral line emissivities have usually been calculated for a Maxwellian electron distribution. In this paper a generalized approach to calculate the iron line flux for a modified Maxwellian distribution is considered. We have calculated the flux ratio of iron lines for the various possible populations of electrons that have been proposed to account for measurements of hard X-ray excess emission from the clusters A2199 and Coma. We found that the influence of the suprathermal electron population on the flux ratio is more prominent in low temperature clusters (as Abell 2199) than in high temperature clusters (as Coma).Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in A&

Improvements in the X-ray luminosity function and constraints on the Cosmological parameters from X-ray luminous clusters

We show how to improve constraints on \Omega_m, \sigma_8, and the dark-energy equation-of-state parameter, w, obtained by Mantz et al. (2008) from measurements of the X-ray luminosity function of galaxy clusters, namely MACS, the local BCS and the REFLEX galaxy cluster samples with luminosities L> 3 \times 10^{44} erg/s in the 0.1--2.4 keV band. To this aim, we use Tinker et al. (2008) mass function instead of Jenkins et al. (2001) and the M-L relationship obtained from Del Popolo (2002) and Del Popolo et al. (2005). Using the same methods and priors of Mantz et al. (2008), we find, for a \Lambda$CDM universe, \Omega_m=0.28^{+0.05}_{-0.04} and \sigma_8=0.78^{+0.04}_{-0.05}$ while the result of Mantz et al. (2008) gives less tight constraints $\Omega_m=0.28^{+0.11}_{-0.07}$ and \sigma_8=0.78^{+0.11}_{-0.13}. In the case of a wCDM model, we find \Omega_m=0.27^{+0.07}_{-0.06}, $\sigma_8=0.81^{+0.05}_{-0.06}$ and $w=-1.3^{+0.3}_{-0.4}$, while in Mantz et al. (2008) they are again less tight \Omega_m=0.24^{+0.15}_{-0.07}, \sigma_8=0.85^{+0.13}_{-0.20} and w=-1.4^{+0.4}_{-0.7}. Combining the XLF analysis with the f_{gas}+CMB+SNIa data set results in the constraint \Omega_m=0.269 \pm 0.012, \sigma_8=0.81 \pm 0.021 and w=-1.02 \pm 0.04, to be compared with Mantz et al. (2008), \Omega_m=0.269 \pm 0.016, \sigma_8=0.82 \pm 0.03 and w=-1.02 \pm 0.06. The tightness of the last constraints obtained by Mantz et al. (2008), are fundamentally due to the tightness of the $f_{gas}$+CMB+SNIa constraints and not to their XLF analysis. Our findings, consistent with w=-1, lend additional support to the cosmological-constant model.Comment: 9 pages, 4 Figures. A&A accepted. Paper Subitted Previously To Mantz et al 2009, arXiv:0909.3098 and Mantz et al 2009b, arXiv:0909.309

Adiabatic scaling relations of galaxy clusters

The aim of the present work is to show that, contrary to popular belief, galaxy clusters are **not** expected to be self-similar, even when the only energy sources available are gravity and shock-wave heating. In particular, we investigate the scaling relations between mass, luminosity and temperature of galaxy groups and clusters in the absence of radiative processes. Theoretical expectations are derived from a polytropic model of the intracluster medium and compared with the results of high-resolution adiabatic gasdynamical simulations. It is shown that, in addition to the well-known relation between the mass and concentration of the dark matter halo, the effective polytropic index of the gas also varies systematically with cluster mass, and therefore neither the dark matter nor the gas profiles are exactly self-similar. It is remarkable, though, that the effects of concentration and polytropic index tend to cancel each other, leading to scaling relations whose logarithmic slopes roughly match the predictions of the most basic self-similar models. We provide a phenomenological fit to the relation between polytropic index and concentration, as well as a self-consistent scheme to derive the non-linear scaling relations expected for any cosmology and the best-fit normalizations of the M-T, L-T and F-T relations appropriate for a Lambda-CDM universe. The predicted scaling relations reproduce observational data reasonably well for massive clusters, where the effects of cooling and star formation are expected to play a minor role.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures, accepted by MNRA

CANGAROO-III search for TeV Gamma-rays from two clusters of galaxies

Because accretion and merger shocks in clusters of galaxies may accelerate particles to high energies, clusters are candidate sites for the origin of ultra-high-energy (UHE) cosmic-rays. A prediction was presented for gamma-ray emission from a cluster of galaxies at a detectable level with the current generation of imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. The gamma-ray emission was produced via inverse Compton upscattering of cosmic microwave background (CMB) photons by electron-positron pairs generated by collisions of UHE cosmic rays in the cluster. We observed two clusters of galaxies, Abell 3667 and Abell 4038, searching for very-high-energy gamma-ray emission with the CANGAROO-III atmospheric Cherenkov telescope system in 2006. The analysis showed no significant excess around these clusters, yielding upper limits on the gamma-ray emission. From a comparison of the upper limit for the north-west radio relic region of Abell 3667 with a model prediction, we derive a lower limit for the magnetic field of the region of ~0.1 micro G. This shows the potential of gamma-ray observations in studies of the cluster environment. We also discuss the flux upper limit from cluster center regions using a model of gamma-ray emission from neutral pions produced in hadronic collisions of cosmic-ray protons with the intra-cluster medium (ICM). The derived upper limit of the cosmic-ray energy density within this framework is an order of magnitude higher than that of our Galaxy.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, Accepted in Ap