Thermodynamic Profiles of Galaxy Clusters from a Joint X-ray/SZ Analysis

Abstract

We jointly analyze Bolocam Sunyaev-Zeldovich (SZ) effect and Chandra X-ray data for a set of 45 clusters to derive gas density and temperature profiles without using spectroscopic information. The sample spans the mass and redshift range $3\times 10^{14}{M}_{\odot }\le M_{500}\le 25\times 10^{14}{M}_{\odot }$ and $0.15\le z\le 0.89$. We define cool-core (CC) and non-cool core (NCC) subsamples based on the central X-ray luminosity, and 17/45 clusters are classified as CC. In general, the profiles derived from our analysis are found to be in good agreement with previous analyses, and profile constraints beyond $r_{500}$ are obtained for 34/45 clusters. In approximately 30% of the CC clusters our analysis shows a central temperature drop with a statistical significance of $>3\ddot{I}ƒ$; this modest detection fraction is due mainly to a combination of coarse angular resolution and modest S/N in the SZ data. Most clusters are consistent with an isothermal profile at the largest radii near $r_{500}$, although 9/45 show a significant temperature decrease with increasing radius. The sample mean density profile is in good agreement with previous studies, and shows a minimum intrinsic scatter of approximately 10% near $0.5\times r_{500}$. The sample mean temperature profile is consistent with isothermal, and has an intrinsic scatter of approximately 50% independent of radius. This scatter is significantly higher compared to earlier X-ray-only studies, which find intrinsic scatters near 10%, likely due to a combination of unaccounted for non-idealities in the SZ noise, projection effects, and sample selection.

42 pages, 52 figures