Related papers: Brightest Cluster Galaxy Alignments in Merging Clu…
Observations of 170 local ($z\lesssim0.08$) galaxy clusters in the northern hemisphere have been obtained with the Wendelstein Telescope Wide Field Imager (WWFI). We correct for systematic effects such as point-spread function broadening,…
A study of the globular cluster systems of 23 brightest, or central, galaxies in 19 Abell clusters has recently been completed. This Letter presents some of the newly discovered correlations of the globular cluster specific frequency $S_N$…
We show that the distribution of luminosities of Brightest Cluster Galaxies in an SDSS-based group catalog suggests that BCG luminosities are just the statistical extremes of the group galaxy luminosity function. This latter happens to be…
We present a study of the evolution of brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs) in a sample of clusters at $0.05 \leq z<0.35$ from the SDSS and WISE with halo masses in the range $6 \times 10^{13}M_\odot$ (massive groups) - $10^{15.5}M_\odot$…
We constrain the evolution of the brightest cluster galaxy plus intracluster light (BCG+ICL) using an ensemble of 42 galaxy groups and clusters that span redshifts of z = 0.05-1.75 and masses of $M_{500,c}=2\times10^{13}-10^{15}$ M$_\odot$…
Using the redMaPPer cluster catalogue based on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) photometry, we investigate the importance of major mergers in the stellar mass build-up of brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs) between $0.08 \leq z \leq 0.50$.…
We present deep, large area B and r' imaging for a sample of 49 brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs). The clusters were selected by their x-ray luminosity and redshift to form two volume limited samples, one with mean redshift ~ 0.07 and one…
I discuss and review recent studies of the signatures of activity in brightest cluster galaxies. Mid-IR spectra appear to show indications of star formation in a sample of 9 BCGs from de Messieres et al. (2009). Other processes like cosmic…
We have fitted the Mg2 absorption index gradients for 21 brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs), in the nearby Universe, for which we have obtained high signal-to-noise ratio, long-slit spectra on the Gemini telescopes. This is a sub-sample of a…
We characterise the typical offset between the Dark Matter (DM) projected centre and the Brightest Cluster Galaxy (BCG) in 10,000 SDSS clusters. To place constraints on the centre of DM, we use an automated strong-lensing analysis,…
We explore the distribution of position angles (PA) of galaxies in clusters. We selected for study the isolated clusters, since the distribution of the galaxy orientation in clusters with close neighbors could be altered by gravitational…
We investigate the photometric properties of the early type Brightest Cluster Galaxies (BCGs) using a carefully selected sample of 85 BCGs from the C4 cluster catalogue with redshift less than 0.1. We perform accurate background…
This is the first of a series of papers devoted to the investigation of a large sample of brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs), their kinematic and stellar population properties, and the relationships between those and the properties of the…
Using Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) spectroscopy, we analyse the stellar kinematics of 18 brightest group early-type (BGEs) galaxies, selected from the Complete Local-Volume Groups Sample (CLoGS). We analyse the kinematic maps…
A large sample of cosmological hydrodynamical zoom-in simulations with Adaptive Mesh Refinement (AMR) is analysed to study the properties of simulated Brightest Cluster Galaxies (BCGs). Following the formation and evolution of BCGs requires…
Galaxy clusters grow through the accretion of galaxies from groups, filaments, and other clusters. During this process, galaxies may undergo pre-processing in lower-density environments, where galaxy-galaxy mergers and other interactions…
We analyse spatially-resolved deep optical spectroscopy of Brightest Cluster Galaxies (BCGs) located in 32 massive clusters with redshifts of 0.05 $\leq z \leq$ 0.30, to investigate their velocity dispersion profiles. We compare these…
Recent reports suggest that elliptical galaxies have increased their size dramatically over the last ~8 Gyr. This result points to a major re-think of the processes dominating the latetime evolution of galaxies. In this paper we present the…
Using a sample of 98 galaxy clusters recently imaged in the near infra-red with the ESO NTT, WIYN and WHT telescopes, supplemented with 33 clusters from the ESO archive, we measure how the stellar mass of the most massive galaxies in the…
A striking signal of dark matter beyond the standard model is the existence of cores in the centre of galaxy clusters. Recent simulations predict that a Brightest Cluster Galaxy (BCG) inside a cored galaxy cluster will exhibit residual…