The evolution of the properties of the hot gas that fills the potential well of galaxy clusters is poorly known, since models are unable to give robust predictions and observations lack a sufficient redshift leverage and are affected by selection eff
ects. Here, with just two high redshift, z approx 1.8, clusters avoiding selection biases, we obtain a significant extension of the redshift range and we begin to constrain the possible evolution of the X-ray luminosity vs temperature relation. The two clusters, JKC041 at z=2.2 and ISCSJ1438+3414 at z=1.41, are respectively the most distant cluster overall, and the second most distant that can be used for studying scaling relations. Their location in the X-ray luminosity vs temperature plane, with an X-ray luminosity 5 times lower than expected, suggests at the 95 % confidence that the evolution of the intracluster medium has not been self-similar in the last three quarters of the Universe age. Our conclusion is reinforced by data on a third, X-ray selected, high redshift cluster, too faint for its temperature when compared to a sample of similarly selected objects. Our data suggest that non-gravitational effects, such as the baryon physics, influence the evolution of galaxy cluster. Precise knowledge of evolution is central for using galaxy clusters as cosmological probes in planned X-ray surveys such as WFXT or JDEM.
We present deep I and z imaging of the colour-selected cluster RzCS 052 and study the color-magnitude relation of this cluster, its scatter, the morphological distribution on the red sequence, the luminosity and stellar mass functions of red galaxies
and the cluster blue fraction. We find that the stellar populations of early type galaxies in this cluster are uniformly old and that their luminosity function does not show any sign of evolution other than the passive evolution of their stellar populations. We rule out a significant contribution from mergers in the buildup of the red sequence of RzCS 052. The cluster has a large (~30%) blue fraction and and we infer that the evolution of the blue galaxies is faster than an exponentially declining star formation model and that these objects have probably experienced starburst episodes. Mergers are unlikely to be the driver of the observed colour evolution, because of the measured constancy of the mass function, as derived from near-infrared photometry of 32 clusters, including RzCS 052, presented in a related paper. Mechanisms with clustercentric radial dependent efficiencies are disfavored as well, because of the observed constant blue fraction with clustercentric distance.
