No Arabic abstract
Context. The XXL Survey is the largest survey carried out by the XMM-Newton satellite and covers a total area of 50 square degrees distributed over two fields. It primarily aims at investigating the large-scale structures of the Universe using the distribution of galaxy clusters and active galactic nuclei as tracers of the matter distribution. Aims. This article presents the XXL bright cluster sample, a subsample of 100 galaxy clusters selected from the full XXL catalogue by setting a lower limit of $3times 10^{-14},mathrm{erg ,s^{-1}cm^{-2}}$ on the source flux within a 1$^{prime}$ aperture. Methods. The selection function was estimated using a mixture of Monte Carlo simulations and analytical recipes that closely reproduce the source selection process. An extensive spectroscopic follow-up provided redshifts for 97 of the 100 clusters. We derived accurate X-ray parameters for all the sources. Scaling relations were self-consistently derived from the same sample in other publications of the series. On this basis, we study the number density, luminosity function, and spatial distribution of the sample. Results. The bright cluster sample consists of systems with masses between $M_{500}=7times 10^{13}$ and $3times 10^{14} M_odot$, mostly located between $z=0.1$ and 0.5. The observed sky density of clusters is slightly below the predictions from the WMAP9 model, and significantly below the predictions from the Planck 2015 cosmology. In general, within the current uncertainties of the cluster mass calibration, models with higher values of $sigma_8$ and/or $Omega_m$ appear more difficult to accommodate. We provide tight constraints on the cluster differential luminosity function and find no hint of evolution out to $zsim1$. We also find strong evidence for the presence of large-scale structures in the XXL bright cluster sample and identify five new superclusters.
Traditionally, galaxy clusters have been expected to retain all the material accreted since their formation epoch. For this reason, their matter content should be representative of the Universe as a whole, and thus their baryon fraction should be close to the Universal baryon fraction. We make use of the sample of the 100 brightest galaxy clusters discovered in the XXL Survey to investigate the fraction of baryons in the form of hot gas and stars in the cluster population. We measure the gas masses of the detected halos and use a mass--temperature relation directly calibrated using weak-lensing measurements for a subset of XXL clusters to estimate the halo mass. We find that the weak-lensing calibrated gas fraction of XXL-100-GC clusters is substantially lower than was found in previous studies using hydrostatic masses. Our best-fit relation between gas fraction and mass reads $f_{rm gas,500}=0.055_{-0.006}^{+0.007}left(M_{rm 500}/10^{14}M_odotright)^{0.21_{-0.10}^{+0.11}}$. The baryon budget of galaxy clusters therefore falls short of the Universal baryon fraction by about a factor of two at $r_{rm 500}$. Our measurements require a hydrostatic bias $1-b=M_X/M_{rm WL}=0.72_{-0.07}^{+0.08}$ to match the gas fraction obtained using lensing and hydrostatic equilibrium. Comparing our gas fraction measurements with the expectations from numerical simulations, our results favour an extreme feedback scheme in which a significant fraction of the baryons are expelled from the cores of halos. This model is, however, in contrast with the thermodynamical properties of observed halos, which might suggest that weak-lensing masses are overestimated. We note that a mass bias $1-b=0.58$ as required to reconcile Planck CMB and cluster counts should translate into an even lower baryon fraction, which poses a major challenge to our current understanding of galaxy clusters. [Abridged]
The XXL survey is the largest survey carried out by XMM-Newton. Covering an area of 50deg$^2$, the survey contains $sim450$ galaxy clusters out to a redshift $sim$2 and to an X-ray flux limit of $sim5times10^{-15}erg,s^{-1}cm^{-2}$. This paper is part of the first release of XXL results focussed on the bright cluster sample. We investigate the scaling relation between weak-lensing mass and X-ray temperature for the brightest clusters in XXL. The scaling relation is used to estimate the mass of all 100 clusters in XXL-100-GC. Based on a subsample of 38 objects that lie within the intersection of the northern XXL field and the publicly available CFHTLenS catalog, we derive the $M_{WL}$ of each system with careful considerations of the systematics. The clusters lie at $0.1<z<0.6$ and span a range of $ Tsimeq1-5keV$. We combine our sample with 58 clusters from the literature, increasing the range out to 10keV. To date, this is the largest sample of clusters with $M_{WL}$ measurements that has been used to study the mass-temperature relation. The fit ($Mpropto T^b$) to the XXL clusters returns a slope $b=1.78^{+0.37}_{-0.32}$ and intrinsic scatter $sigma_{ln M|T}simeq0.53$; the scatter is dominated by disturbed clusters. The fit to the combined sample of 96 clusters is in tension with self-similarity, $b=1.67pm0.12$ and $sigma_{ln M|T}simeq0.41$. Overall our results demonstrate the feasibility of ground-based weak-lensing scaling relation studies down to cool systems of $sim1keV$ temperature and highlight that the current data and samples are a limit to our statistical precision. As such we are unable to determine whether the validity of hydrostatic equilibrium is a function of halo mass. An enlarged sample of cool systems, deeper weak-lensing data, and robust modelling of the selection function will help to explore these issues further.
Context. Scaling relations between cluster properties embody the formation and evolution of cosmic structure. Intrinsic scatters and correlations between X-ray properties are determined from merger history, baryonic processes, and dynamical state. Aims. We look for an unbiased measurement of the scatter covariance matrix between the three main X-ray observable quantities attainable in large X-ray surveys -- temperature, luminosity, and gas mass. This also gives us the cluster property with the lowest conditional intrinsic scatter at fixed mass. Methods. Intrinsic scatters and correlations can be measured under the assumption that the observable properties of the intra-cluster medium hosted in clusters are log-normally distributed around power-law scaling relations. The proposed method is self-consistent, based on minimal assumptions, and requires neither the external calibration by weak lensing, dynamical, or hydrostatic masses nor the knowledge of the mass completeness. Results. We analyzed the 100 brightest clusters detected in the XXL Survey and their X-ray properties measured within a fixed radius of 300 kpc. The gas mass is the less scattered proxy (~8%). The temperature (~20%) is intrinsically less scattered than the luminosity (~30%) but it is measured with a larger observational uncertainty. We found some evidence that gas mass, temperature and luminosity are positively correlated. Time-evolutions are in agreement with the self-similar scenario, but the luminosity-temperature and the gas mass-temperature relations are steeper. Conclusions. Positive correlations between X-ray properties can be determined by the dynamical state and the merger history of the halos. The slopes of the scaling relations are affected by radiative processes.
In the currently debated context of using clusters of galaxies as cosmological probes, the need for well-defined cluster samples is critical. The XXL Survey has been specifically designed to provide a well characterised sample of some 500 X-ray detected clusters suitable for cosmological studies. The main goal of present article is to make public and describe the properties of the cluster catalogue in its present state, as well as of associated catalogues as super-clusters and fossil groups. We release a sample containing 365 clusters in total. We give the details of the follow-up observations and explain the procedure adopted to validate the cluster spectroscopic redshifts. Considering the whole XXL cluster sample, we have provided two types of selection, both complete in a particular sense: one based on flux-morphology criteria, and an alternative based on the [0.5-2] keV flux within one arcmin of the cluster centre. We have also provided X-ray temperature measurements for 80$%$ of the clusters having a flux larger than 9$times$10$^{-15}$$rm thinspace erg , s^{-1} , cm^{-2}$. Our cluster sample extends from z$sim$0 to z$sim$1.2, with one cluster at z$sim$2. Clusters were identified through a mean number of six spectroscopically confirmed cluster members. Our updated luminosity function and luminosity-temperature relation are compatible with our previous determinations based on the 100 brightest clusters, but show smaller uncertainties. We also present an enlarged list of super-clusters and a sample of 18 possible fossil groups. This intermediate publication is the last before the final release of the complete XXL cluster catalogue when the ongoing C2 cluster spectroscopic follow-up is complete. It provides a unique inventory of medium-mass clusters over a 50~dd area out to z$sim$1.
We present the analysis of the luminosity function of a large sample of galaxy clusters from the Northern Sky Optical Cluster Survey, using latest data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Our global luminosity function (down to M_r<= -16) does not show the presence of an upturn at faint magnitudes, while we do observe a strong dependence of its shape on both richness and cluster-centric radius, with a brightening of M^* and an increase of the dwarf to giant ratio with richness, indicating that more massive systems are more efficient in creating/retaining a population of dwarf satellites. This is observed both within physical (0.5 R_200) and fixed (0.5 Mpc) apertures, suggesting that the trend is either due to a global effect, operating at all scales, or to a local one but operating on even smaller scales. We further observe a decrease of the relative number of dwarf galaxies towards the cluster center; this is most probably due to tidal collisions or collisional disruption of the dwarfs since merging processes are inhibited by the high velocity dispersions in cluster cores and, furthermore, we do not observe a strong dependence of the bright end on the environment. We find indication that the dwarf to giant ratio decreases with increasing redshift, within 0.07<z<0.2. We also measure a trend for stronger suppression of faint galaxies (below M^*+2) with increasing redshift in poor systems, with respect to more massive ones, indicating that the evolutionary stage of less massive galaxies depends more critically on the environment. Finally we point out that the luminosity function is far from universal; hence the uncertainties introduced by the different methods used to build a composite function may partially explain the variety of faint-end slopes reported in the literature as well as, in some cases, the presence of a faint-end upturn.